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The Silver fell in a shower” — Page 13 



The Silver Shower 

and Other Stories 
for Young Readers 


Selected by 

MRS. REBECCA E. SELLEW 


* 


Published by W. B. ROSE 
1132 Washington Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 



Copyright, 1914 

BY 

W. B. ROSE 



AUG -8 1914 


© Cl, A 3 7 6 9 2 2 

* U, 


FOREWORD 


This volume is a selection of choice stories 
for young people. 

That Mrs. Sellew has succeeded admirably 
in her effort to provide entertaining reading 
for the young folks will appear from a pe- 
rusal of any one of the twenty-nine chapters 
composing the book. These valuable services 
have been kindly given to the house, and no 
royalty is asked on sales. 

We were deeply affected as we read 
through the pages for publication, and feel 
sure that the book will prove to be a bless- 
ing as well as an inspiration to the youth- 
ful reader. 


The Publisher. 



CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAGE 

I. The Silver Shower 7 

II. When Marco Forgot 16 

III. Robert Wilson’s Reservoir 24 

IV. A Burning Oil Tank 32 

V. Tommy’s Courage 36 

VI. Little Dan’s Christmas 44 

VII. A Gift from the Sea 51 

VIII. Honor Among Newsboys 62 

IX. Largest Clock on Earth 64 

X. Boy Wanted 67 

XI. An English Story 72 

XII. % The Boy Inside the Clothes 79 

XIII. How He Came Out Ahead 86 

XIV. The Way to Heaven 93 

XV. Hinges 97 

XVI. A Full Pail 102 

XVII. Frank’s Lesson 107 

XVIII. Keep Your Eye on the Main Point 110 

XIX. The Hill Twins and the Mill 

Twins 113 

XX. A New Hand at the Bellows. . . . 119 

XXI. Coals of Fire 123 

XXII. John Ploughman, Jr 128 

XXIII. “I Trust You” 130 

XXIV. How I Would Paint a Saloon.. 135 

XXV. Life for the Czar 138 

XXVI. Her Religion 144 

XXVII. Lelia’s Tenth 148 

XXVIII. Making a Start 154 

XXIX. Kindness 158 














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I. 


THE SILVER SHOWER. 

T WAS a hot, breathless day in July, 
the twenty-fifth of the month, as 
Dic-k Simpson was fully aware, for 
it was his sixteenth birthday, and 
his heart swelled as he drove the rubber-tired 
buggy along the shady road toward the vil- 
lage of Deepville. 

Something decidedly heavy in his pocket 
reminded him, over and over, of the twenty 
silver dollars that reposed there. Dick was 
the son of a well-to-do farmer, and, though 
his father was not close in giving him spend- 
ing money, it was not often that Dick had so 
much as twenty dollars to do with as he 
pleased. 

During the strawberry season Dick had 
worked with the pickers on his father’s farm, 
and the amount he had earned was repre- 
sented by the twenty dollars now in his 
pocket. He had already planned what he 
would do with it. There was a certain skiff 



7 


8 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


in the boatmaker’s shop at Deepville — a 
dainty affair of the palest watery blue, with 
the name of “The Water Witch” painted 
across its stern, and it was this that Dick 
had set his heart on. 

How pretty it would look on the little lake 
just back of the wooded pasture! He had 
dreamed of seeing it there, and now his 
dream was about to be realized. 

These pleasant reflections were interrupted 
by the voice of Sim Martin, who stood lean- 
ing over the gate in front of his house, as 
Dick was driving by. 

“Going to Deepville?” called the voice. 

“Yes, sir,” replied Dick, drawing rein. 

“Well, that’s fortunate,” remarked the 
farmer, ‘‘that is, if you don’t mind doing me 
a little favor.” 

“I shall be glad to accommodate you,” said 
Dick. 

“I knew you would,” nodded the farmer. 
“It will save me a trip to town, and I’m quite 
busy just now. You know where Granny 
Peters lives ?” 

“Oh, yes, sir!” replied Dick. “She lives 
in a little cabin about a mile farther on.” 

“That’s right. Poor thing! She’s got to 
go to the poor farm. She’s been getting along 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


9 


poorly for a long time, and now something 
must be done. I was over to the county court 
yesterday, and it was decided to send her to 
the poor farm, where she can be taken care 
of. It will be best for her, although she has 
always been set against going. I was going 
to take her over this morning, but as you 
are to pass right by the poor farm, and are 
willing to do me this favor, I’ll just ask you 
to take her along. I’ll venture you’re not the 
kind of a lad that would be ashamed to let 
her ride with you.” 

Dick w^as surprised by the revelation of 
what he was to do, but he cheerfully an- 
swered that he would willingly do what the 
farmer asked. 

Farmer Martin nodded approvingly. He 
took a paper from his pocket and gave it to 
Dick, saying, “Give this to the matron of the 
poor farm, and she will take care of Granny.” 

Dick drove on along the shady road, won- 
dering what must be the thoughts of one who 
was compelled to go to the poor farm. He 
was too young to realize how much such a 
thing could mean to one who was old and 
poor and friendless, yet he could feel some- 
thing of it as he tried to think of himself 
in Granny Peters’ place. 


10 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


As lie drew rein in front of the lone wo- 
man’s shanty, he could see no one about the 
place, but, as he got out and approached, he 
saw Granny Peters emerge from behind a 
row of blooming hollyhocks and take a seat 
near the little side porch. 

Dick tipped his cap as he advanced to 
meet her. There was a dejected look on her 
aged face, and stains of tears on her with- 
ered cheeks. She lifted her hand and 
brushed away the traces of tears as she 
glanced at Dick. 

“Oh, it is you, is it, Master Dick?” she 
said, as he drew near. “I thought at first 
that it was Mr. Martin coming for me. Maybe 
you haven’t heard of it, but they are going to 
take me to the poor farm. I wonder why I 
could not have gone to my grave instead. Oh, 
Master Dick, you can’t ever know — I pray 
to God that you never may know — what it is 
to be taken there.” 

She bent her head and the tears flowed over 
her cheeks. Dick was strangely moved by 
her distress, and he did not have the courage 
to tell her of his errand. 

“This little cabin and the acre of ground 
is all I have in the world,” she went on, “but 
it has been my home for thirty years. I want 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


11 


to end my days here, but they tell me that 1 
am now too old to work, and that I must be 
taken to the poor farm where I can better 
be provided for. The neighbors have been 
kind to me, and with what they have given 
me and what I have been able to raise in my 
garden, I have managed to live. But now 
it is all over, and I must go to the poor- 
house.” 

A dry sob choked her utterance. 

Dick tried to frame some words of consola- 
tion, but he knew not what to say to her. 
Her distress made him feel as if he had come 
to take her to prison. 

‘‘Do you hate so much to go?” he said at 
length. 

“I feel as if I were going to prison,” she 
replied. “Maybe I am ungrateful to feel so, 
but I can't help it. It is a bitter thought to 
think of having to spend one’s days as a 
pauper, with nothing in life but to wait to fill 
a pauper’s grave. You may not understand 
it, my boy, but when I think of going to the 
poorhouse, this little shanty of mine, with 
its garden, the flowers I have planted with 
my own hands, the little fireplace by which I 
have sat so many evenings and knitted or 
quilted to earn a little money to support mv 


12 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


self — it seems like a paradise to me. And I 
have always been able to work till last spring 
when I had the fever. All my little savings 
went then, and now there is nothing left for 
me but to go to the poorhouse. And I must 
go. But if they would only give me work to 
do — something by which I could earn my own 
living — for I can work yet — you don’t know 
how happy I would be. It is not false pride, 
Dick, that makes me feel as I do. It is so 
good to be home. As we grow older, Dick, 
we grow fonder of the place where we’ve lived 
all our days. Come, see the garden ; I spend 
much time there. It seems something to live 
for.” 

Dick followed her along the path where the 
hollyhocks were blooming, and on either side 
were little beds of vegetables, scrupulously 
clean of weeds. 

“It’s hard to leave all of these,” she said, 
in a shaky voice. “The cabin will fall to 
pieces and weeds run over the place. I shall 
think of it continually. Dick, won’t you 
come here sometimes and pull the weeds 
away from the flowers? I want them to live 
through this summer which is to be their last. 
It will comfort me to know that someone else 
sees and cares for them. Will you come? 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


13 


“I will,” responded Dick, deeply touched 
by her words. 

When they had returned from the garden, 
Dick asked, “But why should you go away 
if you would so much rather stay?” 

“My dear boy,” replied the old woman, “I 
have nothing to live on, and must go where 
I shall have food and shelter, they tell me.” 

A sudden thought came to Dick. He drew 
the twenty silver dollars from his pocket and 
dropped them into Granny Peters’ hands. 

“Would these help you to stay a little 
longer?” he asked. “I will see father and 
Mr. Martin and am sure they would do some- 
thing—” 

The silver fell in a shower into the wo- 
man’s trembling hands. She sat looking 
at Dick in a dazed, bewildered manner. Then 
her lips trembled and the tears started to 
her eyes. 

“You — you don’t mean it?” she said. “You 
have a good face, Dick, and surely — surely 
you wouldn’t mock a poor old woman?” 

“Not for the world,” said Dick. “The 
money is mine to do with as I please, and if 
it will help you to stay in your home here a 
little longer, it is yours.” 


14 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


So long as Dick should live he could never 
forget the look of joy that transfigured the 
face of the lonely woman. She caught his 
hands and pressed her lips to them, the tears 
running down her cheeks and falling on 
Dick’s hands. 

As soon as her emotion would permit her 
to speak, she said: “God must have sent 
you, and I know He will reward you if I 
shall never be able to. But, oh, will it be 
selfish in me to take this money?” 

“You must take it,” broke in Dick, for 
the first time feeling that sense of the blessed- 
ness of giving. “It would be of so little use 
to me, compared with the good it would do 
you.” 

She sat there in the yard, laughing and 
crying by turns, and holding up the shining 
coins as Dick bade her good-bye and started 
for home. 

As lie drove along the tree-fringed road 
a little later, the thought of the happy face 
of Granny Peters filled him with a joy he 
had never before experienced. 

On his return from the village he was 
hailed by Farmer Martin, who came from 
his plow to greet him. 

“I expect Granny was considerably put 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


15 


out by having to go to the poor farm?” he 
said, inquiringly. 

“I didn’t take her,” said Dick. 

‘•What! Didn’t take her? What has hap- 
pened?” 

Dick explained in a few words, giving an 
account of the woman’s distress at the pros- 
pect of having to leave her home. 

Martin scratched his head, reflectively. 

“Dick,” lie said, presently, “I have got a 
good many gray hairs in my head, but they 
don’t seem to have brought much wisdom. I 
think the Book says something about learn- 
ing from babes, and I begin to see the truth 
of it. Well, I guess it was the hand of Provi- 
dence that sent you to Granny Peters this 
morning in place of me. She shall not be 
taken from her home, you may be sure of 
that; and you have taught some of us a les- 
son that we shall not forget.” 

And, as Dick drove toward his home, there 
was before him the surprised face of Granny 
Peters, as the silver shower fell about her, 
and never once did he think of the boat that 
had occupied his thoughts as he rode toward 
the village that morning. 


II. 


WHEN MARCO FORGOT. 

OU forgot?” repeated the superin- 
tendent, looking down at Marco 
with eyes that seemed to go straight 
through him. 

“Yes, sir, I forgot,” the boy answered quiet- 
ly, and with a little defiance in his tones. 
The man waited a moment half-expectantly 
and then added: “Well, what else?” 

Marco looked up surprised. “There is 
nothing else. I forgot.” 

“I thought you might have some explana- 
tion to make,” the superintendent contin- 
ued slowly, moving toward the door. Marco 
opened his lips as if to speak, but he closed 
them again and shook his head. He knew 
that he was forfeiting his position by keep- 
ing silent. Yet he could not speak, not 
without incriminating another. 

“Well, I’ll see you after business hours,” 
Mr. Maxwell, the man at the head of the of- 
fice, said firmly, “Pm busy now.” It had 

- ' c 



WHEN MARCO FORGOT 


17 


been a miserable interview for Marco. The 
piece of work had been laid out for him and 
there had been no thought of his failure un- 
til Peterson — little Jimmy Peterson — had 
come up to his desk with tears in his eyes. 
Jimmy was a hunchback, whose salary was 
the only thing that stood between him and 
starvation. He could do mechanical draw- 
ing skilfully under the direction of a head 
draughtsman, and in time he would be fitted 
to earn a good living at the trade. 

But Jimmy sometimes had trouble with 
his back; the pain was so great he could 
not work. There had been an important piece 
of drafting in the office that afternoon, and 
Jimmy had had one of his painful attacks. 
“I can’t do it, Marco,” he pleaded. “My hand 
trembles and — the pain in my back. But it 
must be done. Mr. Maxwell says that ” 

“What is it, Jimmy?” Marco asked. “I’ll 
help you.” 

Then he had become so absorbed in Jim- 
my’s work that he forgot his own assignment. 
“Yes, I forgot,” he murmured to himself, 
“and that’s all there is to it. I suppose Mr. 
Maxwell will discharge me, but I can stand 
it better than Jimmy..-. He can’t afford to 
lose his place.” 


18 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


The superintendent did not see Marco 
after business hours. He was so absorbed 
in other matters that the incident slipped his 
mind, but the following morning Marco ap- 
peared at his office. “Well, what can I do 
for you?” the superintendent finally asked, 
looking uj) from his work. 

“I thought you had something to say to me 
about yesterday,” Marco began; “or if you 
want me to go to work to-day, I’m ready for 
anything you have.” “Oh, I forgot,” exclaimed 
the superintendent. Then something like em- 
barrassment made him hesitate. He remem- 
bered Marco’s words of the previous day. An 
angry flush crossed his cheek, but a moment 
later his better nature predominated, and 
he said with a laugh : “I intended to discharge 
you yesterday. I thought your explanation 
such a foolish one that I wouldn’t have 
a boy around who could make it. But I 
see I’ve made the same excuse for not — not 
attending to my work, and I’m not going to 
punish you for the very thing I do myself, 
unless I’m to share the punishment with 
you. I’ll give you another chance.” 

Marco certainly made the best of the oppor- 
tunity. It was not an easy matter to secure 
a position in the office presided over by Mr. 


WHEN MARCO FORGOT 


ID 


Maxwell, and the training as well as the 
wages were objects to be sought after. 
During the next few weeks Marco worked 
faithfully and diligently. 

One day a rush of orders came into the 
office, and Mr. Maxwell frowned when he 
learned that two of his best men were home 
on the sick list. Important contracts that 
could not be delayed without causing heavy 
losses to the contractors, called for double 
work in the drafting department. “We must 
double up the work somehow,” the superin- 
tendent said, finally. “Each man must take 
extra work.” 

From one desk to another he walked, giving 
a few sharp but clear instructions. Some 
received the extra work with sullen looks, and 
others with stolid indifference. Marco took 
his cheerfully. “All right,” he said, “I’ll 
have it done in time.” 

The superintendent looked askance at him 
and said: “To-night, remember, it must be 
finished.” Marco flushed a little, for it was 
clear to him that the superintendent doubted 
him, and wished to warn him particularly. 
The work was not difficult. A glance over it 
showed Marco that he had ample time to 
finish it before the closing hours, but he 


20 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


gave no chance for accident or interference 
by postponing it. He worked hard all the 
morning, scarcely looking up once to note 
what was going on around him. When the 
noon whistle blew he glanced up cheerfully 
and began to whistle. 

His whistle stopped and his face dropped 
as he caught sight of Jimmy’s drawn, pale 
features. The cripple was working pluckily 
away at his desk, but Marco could see that 
he was suffering. “What is it, Jimmy?” 
he asked, walking over toward him. 

“I’m afraid Mr. Maxwell has given me more 
than I can do,” the young worker replied 
with a brave smile. 

“And you’re not feeling very well, Jimmy?” 

“Not quite so strong as usual.” 

“Then we’ll go out and have lunch to- 
gether,” Marco said pleasantly. “When I 
get through with my work I’ll help you.” 
“But Mr. Maxwell has given every one plenty 
to do,” added Jimmy, looking seriously at 
Marco. 

“Yes, but mine is nearly finished, Jimmy ; I 
think he looks upon me as a shirker ever 
since — ever since — ” “Ever since when?” 
asked Jimmy, as his friend stopped. 

“Never mind, I must get back to work 


WHEN MARCO FORGOT 


21 


early. Are you through ?” Marco took part 
of the noon hour to finish up his drafting, 
and by two o’clock he closed his desk with 
a bang and said: “Now Jimmy, hand over 
some of your problems.” 

Jimmy was paler than in the morning, and 
Marco told him to take it easier. The two 
labored the rest of the afternoon side by 
side. Just before the closing hours the 
superintendent came in. Marco did not see 
him, and with head bent over Jimmy’s desk 
he continued working away, oblivious of the 
hard stare directed toward him. Suddenly 
a voice at his side said, “Forgot your work 
again, Marco?” 

Marco started up with a jump and faced 
the superintendent with a flush on his face. 
“I — I ” he stammered; but the man in- 
terrupted: “This was your second and last 
chance.” 

The boy recovered himself and answered 
quickly: “The work is finished and ready 
for you. I was helping Jimmy because he 
had more than he could do.” The superin- 
tendent was quiet a moment, and then said: 
“Let me see your finished work.” 

Marco produced the papers with the neatly 
drawn diagrams and designs. They were fine 


99 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


specimens of the draughtsman’s art, and the 
boy was proud of them. ‘‘Humph !” said the 
superintendent, returning them. “Then you 
didn’t forget this time?” 

“No, sir, and the other time I ” 

“Well, go on,” returned the superintendent, 
as the boy stopped. But Marco was silent. 
“I have nothing to say. I told you then I 
forgot the work.” 

“Why? Because you were busy with some- 
thing else?” Jimmy who had overheard the 
words, suddenly spoke up : “It was because 
he helped me and forgot his work until too 
late, Mr. Maxwell. I was sick that day and 
my back — ” 

“Jimmy!” interrupted Marco. But Jimmy 
could not be restrained. He had to tell the 
whole story, blurting it out rapidly. “I’ll 
leave, Mr. Maxwell, if you want me to.” 
Without apparently noticing this last sen- 
tence, the superintendent said: “And when 
your back hurts Marco helps you out with 
your work?” 

“Yes, sir, and he gets so absorbed in it 
that he sometimes forgets his own.” 

“No, I don’t any more — not since that 
day,” interrupted Marco, with a laugh. 

“I see,” murmured the superintendent, 


WHEN MAItCO FORGOT 


23 


“Well, Jimmy, we won’t discharge either 
of you.” Then, turning to Marco, he added, 
with a queer smile on his face : “As for you, 
Marco,” and the boy trembled before the 
man’s words and sharp glance, “you can 
keep on helping Jimmy when he needs you, 
and we’ll pay you for overtime.” 


III. 


ROBERT WILSON’S RESERVOIR. 

RS. CARLOCK glanced uneasily at 
the clock, and then peered out of 
the kitchen window into the gather- 
ing gloom. 

“Seems to me Ezra’s a good while getting 
home; he ought to have been here an hour 
ago; I can’t understand what is keeping 
him so long.” 

She dropped the curtain anxiously, and 
taking down the lamp carried it into the 
dining-room and placed it on the neatly set 
table, now made larger by the addition of 
an extra leaf, for three. 

“Don’t see why Ezra needed him any 
more’n I need a girl to help me with my work ; 
it’s all his notion. Guess, if he only thought 
so, he could do the chores some time yet 
without having a boy round. He’ll find they 
cause more trouble than help; anyway, that’s 
my experience !” 

Mrs. Oarlock took out the half-burnt match 



24 


Robert Wilson’s reservoir 


25 


with which she had lit the lamp, and threw 
it into the kitchen stove. 

“And there’s no knowing what sort of a 
boj r he’ll be like. Like’s not he’s inherited 
— well you can’t tell what , when you take a 
boy like this. If I were going to take a boy 
I’d want to know his family history — what 
kind of parents he had, and if his father was 
steady-going and had any bad habits.” 

“Martha!” and a team stopped before the 
door. 

“S’pose I’ve got to be civil, but I can’t be 
more’n that,” and Mrs. Carlock stepped ex- 
citedly out upon the veranda. 

“I’ve got him ; name’s Robert — Robert 
Wilson,” remarked Mr. Carlock by way of 
salutation. “Pretty good size for a boy only 
fourteen.” 

Mrs. Carlock shaded her eyes from the 
light that streamed from the kitchen window. 
“I s’pose the greater his size the more dis- 
agreeable and obstinate he’ll be. Boys usual- 
ly are at that age.” 

Mr. Carlock appeared not to notice his 
wife’s remark. “That’s Martha — Mrs. Carlock, 
Robert. Now suppose you scamper and get 
the lantern ; she’ll show you where you’ll find 
it. Bring it right to the barn, and we’ll un- 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


20 

harness in a hurry, for there are all the chores 
to do before supper. 7 ’ 

Mr. and Mrs. Carlock had no children. The 
two little mounds on the hillside, enclosed by 
the open iron fence, showed where Carl and 
Harold were buried years ago, and with them 
had been laid away the larger part of their 
mother’s love and tenderness. 

“She’s never seemed the same — Martha 
hasn’t — since the babies went,” was her hus- 
band’s oft indulgent assertion, for though he 
frequently felt her inconsiderate remarks, he 
never blamed her, but always treated her 
with the utmost regard and gentleness. 

For years he had wanted to take a boy 
from the orphans’ home, but had been vigor- 
ously opposed by Mrs. Carlock. 

“We can get along a good deal better 
alone than we can with a boy to look after. 
I’d rather do his part of the work out of 
doors than have him around cluttering up.” 

And with this argument as often as the 
matter was mentioned, the question was 
dropped until Ezra Carlock felt he must have 
some of the many steps, so necessary on his 
farm, taken by younger feet. So with milder 
protest and many misgivings Mrs. Carlock 
had finally submitted to the inevitable. 


Robert Wilson’s reservoir 


27 


“You’ll find him a deal of company in a 
little while and be glad to have him round/’ 
prophesied her husband ; but summer length- 
ened into autumn, and winter had again 
given place to spring, and still, to Mrs. Car- 
lock, Robert was but a “nuisance,” to be 
tolerated only from force of necessity. 

“Do you know, Ezra, what that boy of 
yours has done?” 

Mrs. Carlock had just come across lots 
from carrying a cup of jelly to old Mrs. 
Rawson, and stopped resolutely in the row 
where her husband was hoeing. 

“Pulled more weeds out of the corn hills 
since morning than I can hoe in two days, 
and hasn’t shirked either,” replied Ezra, 
playfully, his eyes twinkling. 

“I don’t s’pose you think he could do any- 
thing out of the way,” coldly. “But I guess 
you’ll find he has!” 

Ezra, with a more serious look on his face, 
turned round inquiringly. “He’s gone and 
dammed up the brook just above the ten-acre 
field, and a pretty mess he’s made ! I saw it 
as I came across just now; queer you hadn’t 
noticed it.” 

“Oh, if that’s all, I guess there’s no harm 
done — he only wanted a swimming hole !” 


28 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


“But lie’s flooded more’n an acre, and it’s 
good mowing-land, some of it, too ! But then, 
if you want your land wasted like that, 1 
don’t know’s it’s anything to me. I’ve 
enough other things to worry ’bout since lie 
came here!” 

“Pity she’s so unreconciled to Robert,” 
said Ezra, slowly, as his wife went out of 
sight. “He’s as good a boy as I ever came 
across. I don’t know how I got along with- 
out him.” 

He finished the next few hills and then 
began cleaning the hoe. 

“It’s because she lost” — his voice was un- 
steady. “The fact is, she can’t bear to see 
any other boys around. But I hope she’ll 
come to like him. Robert feels it — he can’t 
help it.” 

The summer had been an unusually dry 
one, and owing to the severe drought the 
crops were almost a failure. 

“I guess, Robert,” said Mr. Oarlock, in 
early September, “we’ll have to get our wash- 
ing water from your pond if there doesn’t 
come a rain before long. The well’s about 
dry, and I don’t believe we’d better use any 
more of that water except for drinking and 
cooking. Guess while I’m gone — don’t expect 


Robert Wilson's reservoir 


29 


I can get back before Thursday — you’d bet- 
ter fix up a cask or two on the cart and haul 
down a load. Fortunate now you dammed 
up the brook; there’s only a little running 
in. Your pond, though, I should judge, holds 
enough to supply the town. It’s a pretty 
handy reservoir.” 

‘‘P’raps I’d better not swim in it any 
more,” laughed Robert. ‘‘If the drought 
doesn’t break before long we may have to 
drink it!” 

“I don’t see what makes it so smoky!” ex- 
claimed Mrs. Oarlock anxiously, the next 
morning. “It’s ever so much more dense 
than it was when I got up.” 

She went to the veranda and looked 
out. 

“The woods must be on fire over beyond 
the hill,” and Robert ran to the knoll above 
the barn to obtain a better view. 

Almost as he spoke a heavy column of 
smoke rolled up from the horizon, which the 
wind spitefully separated, driving it angrily 
into the valley. 

“It’s coming right this way,” cried Mrs. 
Carlock, helplessly. “And there’s hardly a 
drop of water in the well.” 

A bright tongue of flame, then another and 


30 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


another, shot into view. Before one could 
tell it the woods were on lire. 

“We’ll lose everything-. The wind’s exactly 
in this direction, and it’s so dry — ” 

Mrs. Carlock did not finish her sentence, 
but stood rigid, as though fascinated by the 
flames and roar before her. 

Robert caught up an ax and crowbar in 
the barn and hurried across the field, won- 
dering whether lie could carry out his plan. 

“Last we’ll see of him! It’s just’s I told 
Ezra — hasn’t any interest here. He might 
at least have stayed with me — needn’t have 
taken the tools.” 

Of what use they would be to him Mrs. 
Carlock, in her terror, did not stop to con- 
sider. 

“If — if there’s only enough — and I guess 
there is — I can stop it,” panted Robert, as 
he reached the dam. “It’s well the woods 
don’t come clear here.” 

Between the edge of the woods and the 
now empty brook bed was an open field, the 
dry grass of which Mr. Carlock had decided 
was not worth mowing. Below this was a 
five-acre stretch of oat stubble. 

“If I can only stop it this side of the brook, 
I — I can save the buildings and orchard. 


Robert Wilson’s reservoir 


SI 

But I’ve got to break the dam at just the 
right moment!” 

Robert began knocking away the upper 
boards. The fire was rushing nearer — the 
roar was almost deafening. 

“If I can only — ” 

The fire had reached the clearing. On it 
came in angry fury, devouring with mon- 
strous mouthfuls the tinder-like grass. 

“Now!” exclaimed Robert, breathlessly. 

Out plunged the water, licking up the 
flames as they attempted to leap across the 
rushing stream. Then there was a mad race 
between the brook and the fire on its bank. 

Not till the water conquered did Robert 
sink down unconscious from burns and ex- 
haustion. 

As he lay in his clean, soft bed that night 
Mrs. Carlock, her old-time mother love and 
tenderness returned, bent over the swollen 
face and said, “Won’t — won’t you call me 
mother after this, Robert?” 

“I — I’ve always wanted to,” he whispered, 
gladly. 


IV. 


A BURNING OIL TANK. 

H HE accompanying photographic cut 
will give some slight conception of 
burning oil tanks, as seen occa- 
sionally in the oil fields of New 
York, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, 
Indiana, Illinois, Oklahoma or California. 
The better grades of crude petroleum oil con- 
tain a large percentage of light hydro-car- 
bons, such as “gasoline” and “benzine,” 
which, unless closely confined in covered 
steel tanks, evaporate and represent a tre- 
mendous loss ; so it becomes necessary in all 
large oil fields to construct many of these 
large steel tanks, riveted and double riveted 
to be gas-tight, so there can be no possible 
chance of any leakage. 

The standard size of such tanks for many 
years has been thirty-five thousand barrels 
of forty-two gallons each. The cost of such 
a tank to-day is about fifteen thousand dol- 
lars. Each tank is surrounded at a distance 


32 




Burning Oil Tank 





































































A BURNING OIL TANK 


33 


of fifteen or twenty feet with an earthen wall, 
or bank, about five or six feet high, which is 
intended to act as a dam, or dike, in case of 
fire, to prevent the burning oil from over- 
flowing and igniting other tanks, or flowing 
off to destroy other property. 

The cause of the burning in the illustration 
was lightning, and in fact this is the most 
frequent cause. If the bolt does not strike 
the tank itself, it is carried to it by some 
one of the connecting pipe-lines leading to 
or from the tank, and in an instant an explo- 
sion occurs which often tears the crown, or 
steel roof, of the tank to pieces, and the thou- 
sands of barrels of oil are immediately on 
fire. The longer it burns, the more furious 
the fire becomes as the whole tank and body 
of oil become hot. 

If there is any considerable quantity of oil 
in the tank, it will always in a few hours 
“boil over” and create a scene never to be 
forgotten. If the dike of earth is properly 
built and no unforeseen factor enters on the 
scene, it will in some hours, according to the 
quantity, burn itself out, and all that is left 
is the wreck of twisted junk steel plates. 

The Standard Oil Company and all the 
larger producers and storers of petroleum 


34 THE SILVER SHOWER 

have taken advantage of their past costly 
experiences and now reduce the loss and 
danger of such conflagrations to a minimum. 
The one agent employed to smother the fire, if 
taken quickly, is steam, and in many well- 
equipped ‘‘tank farms” and refineries, the 
steam connections are always read} 7 for ser- 
vice, and steam under good pressure is ready 
to turn on at a pioment’s notice. In former 
times, it was customary to bring a cannon 
and shoot a ball through the wall of the tank 
near the bottom, and thus allow the oil to 
run away or be piped away while it was on 
fire at the surface. In this way some of 
the loss and danger were avoided. In more 
recent times the same principle is employed, 
only more scientifically. The connection, be 
it of three-inch, four-inch or six-inch pipe, 
is already made and maintained, and re- 
quires only the opening of a valve, and by 
gravity or through large pumps immediately 
ready for action, the thousands of barrels 
are transferred to another tank, and the loss 
is small and the danger but little as com- 
pared with previous years. 

The value of the oil consumed varies from 
two dollars and fifty cents per barrel for the 
best oils found in Pennsylvania and West 


A BURNING OIL TANK 


Virginia to thirty and forty-one cents for 
Oklahoma crude. 

There are few more interesting tales to be 
told than those wrapped up in the story of 
crude oil from the time it is found one thou- 
sand or two thousand feet under ground, un- 
til it is sold in all its varied forms and by- 
products. The lady uses it in many forms 
as a toilet article, and then goes driving- 
through the country twenty to forty miles an 
hour under power generated by another prod- 
uct of the same crude oil from which that 
is obtained which she keeps on her dresser 
in such harmless form. 


V. 


TOMMY’S COURAGE. 

ITHOUT knowing anything about 
him, the boys had made up their 
minds that Tommy Randall was a 
coward. He and his mother had just 
moved to Wakefield and taken the little house 
near the church. A day or two afterward, 
a small sign with “Mrs. E. Randall, Dress- 
maker, had been posted up beside the door. 

Tommy was the only child, and his father 
had been dead a long time. While they were 
getting settled. Tommy seemed to be every- 
where. The neighbors looked on approving- 
ly, as he carried in boxes and parcels, un- 
packed them, and put the furniture where it 
belonged. He even hung the window cur- 
tains, and, through the open door, Mrs. Gran- 
nis, their next neighbor, saw r him with a big 
apron tied around his neck wiping dishes 
for his mother and doing many other things 
that a boy could do. 

tk He’s good to his mother, that’s certain,” 

36 



tommy’s courage 


37 


said Mrs. Grannis, “and it speaks well for 
them both.” 

When Tommy went to school, Miss John- 
son, the teacher, gave him a desk, and his 
school days began. 

He was soon at the head of his class — 
almost too far advanced for his grade. But 
when Miss Johnson suggested he might be 
promoted with a little more work, he shook 
his head. 

“No, Miss Johnson,” he said. “I’d rather 
be in a class where the work is easy, for that 
gives me time to do other things after school, 
and I want to do that, because — because, 
you know, I ought to.” 

“I understand.” 

Not only did Tommy do the errands and 
help his mother in every possible way at 
home, but he began to be in demand as a 
very quick and reliable errand-boy. He drove 
cows to pasture and back, mowed lawns, and 
Was ready, small as he was, to turn his 
hand to almost anything. 

But it began to be pretty well understood 
that he would not fight. Oddly enough, as 
time went on, he and Stephen Weaver became 
fast friends. Stephen was a big, overgrown 
fellow with light hair, blue eyes and a 


38 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


freckled skin. He was slow at his lessons, 
but had boundless good nature, and he was 
full of admiration for the way in which Tom- 
my could draw maps and work his problems 
in arithmetic. They were together a good 
deal, and the friendship strengthened day 
by day. 

Another boy, George Parsons, whose father 
was the leading merchant in Wakefield, and 
who was much taller and stronger than Tom- 
my and several years his senior, soon dis- 
covered that Tommy would bear a good deal 
of teasing, and he went as far as it was safe 
to do on the playground, snatching his cap, 
holding him with his arms pinioned behind 
his back until Stephen strolled by and sug- 
gested that that sort of fun was rather one- 
sided. Finally, George waylaid Tommy on 
his way home, and the harmless teasing 
became positive torture. 

The lad did his best to defend himself 
without appealing to his mother or to Miss 
Johnson, but he was not very successful. It 
began to be whispered about that he was so 
afraid of Parsons that he had not the spirit 
to resent anything he did. 

“What does make you stand it ?” Stephen 
asked him, discontentedly. 


TOMMY'S COURAGE 


39 


“Just this,” said Tommy. “Mother hates 
fighting. She has begged me not to fight, and 
I won’t. She’s. had trouble enough without 
my worrying her,” he added, under his 
breath. “But I’m not a coward, whatever 
they say.” 

“No, I really don’t think you are,” Stephen 
replied, for he knew that it often took a good 
deal more courage to endure unpleasant 
things than it did to resent them. 

That winter there was very heavy snow, 
and it lay on the ground in deep drifts. One 
night the wind roared like a hurricane in 
the tree-tops, and the wind shifted to the 
south. Then it began to rain, and it poured 
steadily all that night and the next day. The 
day following the little creek just south of 
Wakefield swelled to a raging torrent. There 
was a good deal of uneasiness about the rail- 
road bridge, the foundations of which were 
badly undermined. 

After school the boys went down to look 
at it. A crowd of men had collected on the 
bank, looking at the roaring water and the 
shaking bridge with, what Tommy thought, 
very strange indifference. 

“It’ll not stand much longer,” said Ste- 
phen, as they noticed the heavy driftwood 


40 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


that had caught and was piled high against 
the straining girders. 

Just then a tree that had been torn up by 
the roots reared itself on end, and was 
hurled against the bridge with terrific force. 
There was a crash, a crunching and grinding 
noise, and the structure was swept away — 
all but one slender, swaying girder. The 
men gave an excited shout. Just then George 
Parsons exclaimed: 

“The express — the five o’clock express ! 
It’s nearly due. The train must be stopped ! 
What can be done?” 

Faces turned pale, and the crowd cried 
out in despair. 

It would have done no good to try to de- 
lay the train by telegraph, for it had al- 
ready left the last station, fifteen miles away. 

“There’s just one chance,” said Mr. 
Weaver, Stephen’s father. “If anybody has 
the grit to crawl across that stringer and 
flag the train! It wouldn’t bear a man’s 
weight — but a plucky boy might do it.” 

Every boy there looked at the slender tim- 
ber trembling with the jar of the thundering 
water, and no one volunteered. 

“A hundred lives and more depend upon 
it,” shouted Mr. Weaver. 


tommy’s courage 


41 


“I will try, sir;” and out of the throng 
little Tommy forced his way. “I am light, 
and I do not get dizzy. But oh, if I should 
fall ! My mother — ” 

There was deep silence, for to fall meant 
death for the boy, as well as for the people 
whom he would have vainly tried to save. 

“He mustn’t go — he shan’t go!” Stephen 
cried, trying to hold him back. But Tommy 
gently pushed his hands aside, and thrust 
into the breast of his jacket a scarlet hand- 
kerchief — the danger signal — which one of 
the men gave him. 

On he went, trying not to see the yellow 
foam racing by below him, and steadying 
his nerves by the thought of all that hung 
upon reaching the opposite shore in safety. 
Inch by inch he pressed on; the shore that 
he quitted lay behind him; he hung sus- 
pended in mid-air above the torrent; he could 
not now go back — he must keep on. His 
hands were numb and cold, and his heart 
beat fast, but he did not falter. 

At last it was done. He slipped from the 
timber, rose to his feet, and oh, what a cheer 
went up ! But he did not wait for approval. 
Far off he heard the muffled echo of the ap- 
proaching train. He snatched the handker- 


42 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


chief from his breast and raced down the 
track like a deer, waving his signal frantical- 
ly as he ran. Around the curve, far off, he 
saw the engine, the cloud of smoke trailing 
behind. It was coming rapidly, but he ran 
on. Then the engineer, on the lookout, saw 
him. He caught the gleam of red, and, sus- 
pecting the danger, quickly brought the train 
to a standstill. Breathlessly Tommy shouted : 

“The bridge is gone!” 

“But how did you cross?” cried the engi- 
neer. 

“I — well — I just crawled,” Tommy stam- 
mered. 

The people hurried out of the coaches and 
gathered around the little hero. The train 
moved on again, slowly, halting within sight 
of the wrecked bridge. When the passengers 
saw what an escape they had had, their grati- 
tude knew no bounds. 

The last coach happened to be the vice- 
president’s private car, and Tommy was in- 
vited on board and was asked a good many 
questions about himself. He answered them 
modestly and politely, and the vice-president 
said : 

“You have been well brought up, my lad, 
and you’re as brave as they make them. We 


tommy’s couraue 


43 


need the sort of a man such a boy as you will 
make. I have no boy of my own, and from 
now on I shall keep my eye on you. Finish 
your school, and then we’ll see.” 

It was no indefinite promise, made only 
to be forgotten. The vice-president kept his 
word. But best of all, nobody ever again 
called Tommy Randall a coward. 


VI. 


LITTLE DAN’S CHRISTMAS. 

ITTLE DAN was the smallest news- 
boy on the street. Such a little fel- 
low to be peddling papers ! But he 
had the grit to do it. 

“I can paddle my own canoe,” he said, to 
himself, bravely swallowing a troublesome 
lump that threatened to choke him. “Dad 
said I’d have to, an’ I can.” 

Poor little Dan! His mother was dead 
and his ne’er-do-well father had forsaken him, 
his parting words having been : 

“You kin paddle yer own canoe, yer plenty 
big enough.” 

Dan was only ten years old. If he had 
been born in happier circumstances he would 
have been called a handsome boy; but his 
curly hair was always tangled, his face al- 
ways more or less grimy, and his clothing 
ragged. While Dan’s father lived with him 
he was accustomed to abusive words and 
blows, to hunger and cold, and neglect. But 



44 










*• . 








Little Ban 

















LITTLE DAN'S CHRISTMAS 


45 


now since he had left the boy to ‘‘paddle his 
own canoe," it was not so hard — although 
hard enough — as it had been. He shared an 
attic room with several other newsboys. He 
went to bed early to keep warm. He was 
up as early as the other boys when it was 
morning and out in the cold after the morn- 
ing papers. He paid his small share of rent 
for the attic room, but he was always hungry 
and always tired. His small feet took alto- 
gether too many steps in one day for his 
good. 

One stormy November day, just after he 
had sold his last paper and had started for 
“Old Ma’am Rose’s" shop for a “bit of a 
lunch," something occurred that changed his 
whole life. A nurse, pushing a baby carriage 
across the street, became confused in the 
noise and ran off, leaving her charge, a beau- 
tiful smiling baby, to the mercy of the ap- 
proaching trolley. Dan saw the whole thing, 
the trolley on one side, the prancing horses 
on the other, the baby in her perilous posi- 
tion, and then — and then — I do not know 
how it was done. He was just in time. 
Something surpassingly sweet and clear rang 
in his soul, making him glad, for he had 
pushed the smiling baby in her carriage out 


46 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


of danger. Then, suddenly, following the 
gladness, came a great pain, ending in dark- 
ness. When he aroused from that darkness 
he was in a white bed, and there was a 
sweet-faced, white-capped nurse near by. 

“How’d I get here? An’ where am I?*’ 
he asked, wonderiugly. 

‘‘You’re in the hospital. They brought you 
here in an ambulance. You got hurt saving 
Mrs. Swift’s baby.” 

A light came into Dan’s eyes. 

“Oh,” he cried, “I’m glad I saved the baby. 
I was afraid mebbe I couldn’t, but I did. 
I was just in time.” 

The nurse’s eyes tilled with tears. 

“You were a little hero,” she said ; “that’s 
what they all said, but it’s too bad you were 
hurt, too bad.” 

“I’m glad I saved the baby,” he repeated. 
“She’s got a mother, hasn’t she?” 

“Yes,” the nurse said, “a lovely one.” 

The light deepened in Dan’s eyes. 

“Then she’s glad, too. She'd felt awful if 
the baby’d been killed. She wasn’t even 
hurt — was she?” 

“No, she wasn’t hurt the least bit.” 

“What’s the matter with my legs?” the boy 
asked. “I can’t move ’em.” 


LITTLE DAN’S CHRISTMAS 


47 


“They’re broken, but they’ll be all right 
after a few weeks.” 

“But how about the papers? I’ve got to 
sell ’em — you know.” 

“You can’t sell papers now. You’ll have 
to just stay here and be as patient as you 
can until you get well, which will not be 
very long.” 

The light came into his eyes again. 

“It’s nice here,” he said. “I’d like to stay 
if I’m not too much trouble. I’ve never been 
in such a nice, white place before, an’ it’s 
so clean !” 

“Don’t talk any more just now,” the nurse 
said, gently; “perhaps if you keep quiet you 
will go to sleep again.” 

He wondered why she wanted him to go 
to sleep again, and while wondering, fell 
asleep. When he awoke again a beautiful 
young woman was sitting beside him. A 
great bouquet of red carnations on a small 
stand near his bedside breathed their fra- 
grance over him. Dan looked at the visitor 
questioningly, and she — in answer — stooped 
and kissed his forehead. 

“I’m the baby’s mother, Dan,” she said, 
gently stroking the thin hand that rested on 
the white spread. 


48 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


‘‘Oh,” he cried, “oh!” his face becoming 
radiant, 

“How glad she must be !” was his thought. 
“And how glad I am I saved her baby.” 

“You dear boy ! You little hero ! It makes 
my heart ache to know that you got hurt 
saving my baby.” 

“It’s all right, ma’am ; don’t you fret. You 
see I ain’t got any folks to feel bad. I’m just 
Dan.” 

* # ■» 

Christmas, glad Christmas, had come, Dan 
had not walked yet, but the doctor from the 
hospital had assured him that “he would 
soon be running around as well as ever.” He 
sat on a great cushioned chair — with his legs 
on a padded stool — in Mrs. Swift’s parlor. 
The lovely baby that he had saved was tod- 
dling about the room, approaching him now 
and then with a smiling gurgle of delight, 
holding up her new Christmas dolly for his 
admiration. Sometimes she would shyly 
reach up one of her tiny dimpled hands and 
stroke his thin ones gently. He had never 
loved any one else as he loved this beautiful 
baby, and doubtless it was not altogether be- 
cause of her beauty and charming ways. 
Had he not saved her? And there never 


LITTLE DAN'S CHRISTMAS 


49 


had been any one else as pretty as she was — 
he thought — unless it was her mother, who 
was looking at him now with a lovelight in 
her eyes that he understood. 

‘‘Little Dan/’ she had said, that morning, 
‘‘how would you like me for a Christmas 
gift?” 

“You?” he had questioned, wonderingly. 

“Yes,” she said, with her loving smile; “if 
it had not been for you I should have been 
childless this Christmas day, and I want you 
to be my little Dan, and to stay with me all 
the time.” 

She put her arms around him and drew 
him close to her. It was pathetic to see the 
boy’s face. His cup of joy was full to over- 
flowing. All that he could say at that won- 
derful moment was, “Oh ! oh !” but the glow 
that had come into his heart had come to 
stay. Ah, what a gulf lay between to-day 
and the old days in the attic. Eest and love 
had transformed the little face, which was 
fair and clean now. His gifts were many and 
lay all about him, on his lap, and on the 
table beside him. 

Ca‘sar, an old colored servant, suddenly 
appeared on the scene. “De Christmas din- 
ner am served,” he said with a broad grin. 


50 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


Dan took a long breath of delight. “Ok !” 
he said, “oh!” 

The delicious aroma from roast turkey was 
wafted to him. Caesar was carrying him 
gently into the dining-room. The weary past 
had faded from his mind ; the present was so 
lovely that it seemed like a beautiful dream. 
He folded his hands when grace was said. 
He said his own silently, his face aglow ; 

“You are so good, dear God,” he said to 
himself, “an’ I’m so awful happy.” 


VII. 


A GIFT FROM THE SEA. 

DNA MORRIS paused suddenly at 
the surf-line, her long-handled rake 
uplifted, her startled eyes fixed 
upon something bobbing and toss- 
ing among the mass of seaweed, which 
floated shoreward with the incoming tide. 
Somewhere out on the wide blue ocean there 
had been a storm, and the breakers now 
lashed the shore with a dull, sullen boom. 
The seaweed, dark-colored and thickly 
massed, which the storm had torn from the 
bed of the ocean, was full of strange things. 
Bits of shellfish, and queer little sea-snails, 
and exquisite anemones, starfish and cuttles, 
with quite frequently a delicate branch of 
coral — victims of the gale, perhaps, but 
prizes for the swift scavengers of the air 
darting hither and thither and selecting 
dainties from the bountiful feast which the 
storm had brought them. 

The farmers among the Florida Keys kept 



51 


52 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


close watch of the winds and tides, and when 
the seaweed began to drift in they gathered 
on the shore with forks and long iron rakes, 
drawing the seaweed ashore and piling it in 
great heaps above tide-mark. They used 
it both as fuel and to fertilize their stony 
island. 

On Marquesas there were few farm-houses 
of any size; but there were many fishermen 
and wrecker’s cottages scattered along the 
shore. Edna lived in one of these tiny brown 
huts. She was alone in the world except for 
an aged grandfather, too old now to follow 
the fishing boats which put daily to sea. 
Two brave sons slept beneath the blue waters, 
lost in a storm, almost fourteen years ago, 
when Edna was small. She had been mother- 
less also, for several years. 

She had been raking seaweed for over an 
hour this fresh morning, and had several 
large piles safely stored on the sandy beach. 
Her dress was old and patched, she wore a 
battered hat and her feet were encased in a 
man’s rubber boots, heavy and unwieldy. 
She had stopped with her eyes fixed on the 
floating mass of shining weed mentioned be- 
fore, but her hesitation was only momentary. 
She deliberately waded into the water with 


A GIFT FROM THE SEA 


53 


her long rake. Perhaps it was a good plank. 
It looked like one. Anything that could be 
used for fuel would be well worth saving. As 
she reached out and drew it toward her, she 
found it was a small box or chest. It was 
very heavy and required all her strength to 
drag it beyond reach of the surf. As she 
stooped, half breathless from her exertions, 
to examine it, the sound of wheels behind 
caused her to turn. A man driving a shaggy 
pony hitched to a rude cart, drew rein beside 
her and called out : 

“Homin’, Edna! Fine, ain’t it, arter the 
storm? Any seaweed to sell this mo rain’?” 

“About two cords, I think,” replied Edna, 
returning his greeting. “I shall have more 
by night. I’ve worked only two days.” 

“I’ll give you thirty cents a cord,” said 
the man, shre’wdly. It was a good bargain 
for him, since he could sell it to the better 
class of farmers for twice that sum. 

Edna thankfully received the sixty cents, 
which she proceeded to tie up in a corner of 
her apron. The man’s eyes fell at this junc- 
ture upon the box. 

“Hello!” be exclaimed, sharply. “What’s 
that? a seaman’s chest, eh?” He leaped to 
the ground and examined the box with much 


54 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


interest. He tried to turn it over with his 
foot, but it did not budge. 

‘‘Terrible heavy !” he muttered, bending to 
examine it more closely. There were a name 
and an address on one end, washed dim by 
the waves. He scanned it curiously. Then 
he seized the lid and gave it a wrench. But 
it had three strong locks and held firm. 

‘‘I’ll take it along home and get it open 
there,” he decided finally, and started to 
lift it into his cart. 

Edna, who until this had stood silently 
by, interposed. 

“Please leave the box alone, Mr. Becket,” 
she said, seriously. “I found it out in that 
mass of weed, and you cannot take it away ; 
it is not yours.” 

“Oh, you found it, eh ?” he repeated, some- 
what discomfited. “Then you are the owner, 
Edna. What are you goin’ to do with it?” 

“Send it to the owner,” said the girl, 
briefly. 

“The owner’s dead under twenty fathoms 
of salt water,” said Mr. Becket, grimly. 
“Even if he isn’t, finding is keeping, the 
world over, and you saved it from the sea. 
Now see here, Edna. I like the chest. It’s 
black walnut and will make me a good tool- 


A GIFT FROM THE SEA 


55 


box. I’ll give you a dollar for it just as it 
stands. What do you say, eh ?” 

“The box isn’t mine to sell,” she answered, 
calmly. “I shall send it to the name that’s 
on it.” 

“That’s nonsense,” he said, sharply. “Seems 
to me, if I had a poor old grandfather that 
needed things the way yours does, I wouldn’t 
be so uppity about taking money. Ever got 
enough to buy him those specs yet ?” 

The sudden tears that sprang to the girl’s 
eyes were sufficient answer. 

“There it is !” he said, triumphantly. “The 
poor old man’s half blind, and has no specs, 
and can’t read his Bible or a newspaper, and 
there’s fine ones over in Key West for only 
two dollars. Yet his gran’darter don’t care 
enough for him to get ’em for him, even when 
she’s offered the cash right in hand. It’s 
more than the old box is worth, mind you, 
Edna, but seeing as the old man needs them 
specs, I’ll make it two dollars and take the 
box off your hands now.” 

“If you offered two hundred,” said Edna, 
spiritedly, through her tears, “it would do 
no good. The box is not mine and it shall 
not be sold — so there!” 

He laughed grimly as he made answer ; 


56 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


‘‘All right, then. 1*11 let you sleep over 
it. Mebbe you’ll come to your senses by 
mornin’ — ’specially when you talk it over 
with the old man. He won’t need specs long, 
that’s certain.” 

With which cruel speech he climbed into 
the cart, whipped up the pony and soon dis- 
appeared over the sand dunes. Edna looked 
after him, with a great fear in her eyes. 

“What does he mean?” she asked aloud. 
“Grandpa is old, but he isn’t sick. He’s not 
going to die — ” 

For a moment her eyes rested doubtfully 
on the box. Then she threw the rake across 
her shoulder, saying resolutely: 

“He’s trying to scare me into selling the 
box, but he shan’t have it. I’ll go for the 
wheelbarrow now and fetch it home. He 
shan’t have it — not if I never find the owner ; 
so there, I have settled that.” 

About a quarter of a mile beyond the slope 
of beach stood the cottage occupied by Edna 
and her grandfather. An old man stood in 
the low doorway with a half-mended net in 
his hand. He was gazing toward the sands, 
but as Edna appeared the anxious look gave 
. place to one of relief. 

“I want the wheelbarrow a little while, 


A GIFT FROM THE SEA 


57 


grandpa,” she said, hurriedly. “I'll be back 
pretty soon and get supper.” 

He watched her while she got the wheel- 
barrow and trundled it off across the sands. 
The wind was blowing up chill from the sea, 
and he presently went within. When Edna 
returned he was sitting by the window with 
his net. 

“Come out and look at my treasure-trove, 
grandpa,” she said, gayly. “It looks like a 
seaman’s chest, and Mr. Becket offered me 
two dollars for it, but it has a name and ad- 
dress on it — see?” 

“It’s a queer sort of seaman’s chest,” said 
her grandfather, after examining it thorough- 
ly. “Polished black walnut, perfectly 
matched and joined and water-tight; three 
locks, too. Who ever heard before of a sea- 
man’s chest with three locks? Of course we 
must send it to the owner, but how are we 
going to do it? The mail carrier would take 
it to the shipping office, if we could get it 
to the post road, but that’s a mile off.” 

“I’ll take it there on the wheelbarrow first 
thing in the morning,” said Edna. “It will 
cost fifty cents to send it, and all I have is 
the money Mr. Becket paid me for the weed. 
And grandpa, I was going to buy meal and 


58 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


salt — we’re all out. I don’t see what we are 
going to do.” And a look of anxiety clouded 
her bright face. 

Grandfather picked up the net and went 
placidly to work. 

“Take no thought for the morrow,” he said. 
“We’ve done the best we could, and the Lord 
will look after the rest. I’ve lived a good 
many years, Edna, and in all that time I’ve 
never needed a thing I didn’t get. The Lord 
will not fail us and will supply our present 
needs.” 

“No doubt, the owner will be glad to get 
the box,” said Edna, after a long, thoughtful 
pause. “I’ll write him a letter about it, right 
off.” 

“More than likely the owner’s dead,” said 
Mr. Morris, shaking his head sadly. “But 
there’s apt to be somebody depending on 
him — a widow and children, maybe — and the 
box will come in handy for them.” 

Long before light the next morning Edna 
was up and away. When she returned her 
grandfather had breakfast on the table. 

“He took the box all right, grandpa,” she 
said, cheerily. “And he only charged a quar- 
ter. Was that not kind in him? He says it 
will be paid for in Key West. I am going 


A GIFT FROM THE SEA 


59 


after the meal and salt right after breakfast. 
Then I’ll rake some more seaweed.” 

Late in the afternoon Mr. Becket drove 
down upon the beach, and hearing that the 
box had already gone, his wrath knew no 
bounds, and he proceeded to tell Edna how 
he felt about it. 

‘‘You are the worst girl I ever saw!” he 
cried, contemptuously. “I would have given 
five dollars for the chest sooner than lose 
it, an’ now you’ll get nothing for your pains.” 

He refused to buy any more seaweed of 
the girl, and as she had no other near cus- 
tomers, things looked black for her. At the 
end of a fortnight she had earned but two 
dollars, the potatoes were gone, the meal-jar 
empty, and she was obliged to set off for the 
village in search of something to eat. When 
she returned her face was full of excitement. 

‘‘See, grandpa!” she cried, holding up a 
thick letter. “It’s for me, and has my name 
on it, and it came from Key West. It’s the 
first letter I ever had.” 

With shaky fingers she opened it and drew 
out a small package. 

“It’s money,” she said, wonderingly, and 
with sparkling eyes she spread five bank- 
notes on the table, so she could see what so 


60 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


much money looked like. Never before had 
she seen anything like it. 

Grandfather dropped his net and hurried 
to her side. 

“Twenty-dollar bills!*’ he gasped. “And 
five of them! Edna, girl, read the letter 
and see where they came from !” 

She opened the sheet and read as follows : 

“My Dear Miss Edna: — I was much sur- 
prised to receive your letter and the box. 
They were my first intimation of a ship- 
wreck, though the box was some days over- 
due. It seems a miracle straight from heaven 
that it should thus come to me safe through 
your hands, and I am sending you a slight 
token of my appreciation of your kindness in 
saving and forwarding it so promptly. Do 
not hesitate to take the money. It is rightly 
yours, and but a small salvage for so valu- 
able a flotsam. Had the chest gone wrong, 
I should to-day be a ruined man. Captain 
May tells me your grandfather — your only 
relative— is very feeble, and you are his sole 
support. If you and he will take passage to 
Key West, I have a cottage at your disposal, 
and can assure you of more lucrative and 
congenial employment than seaweed raking. 


A. GIFT FROM THE SEA 


61 


Awaiting your reply, which I feel will be de- 
livered in person, I am 

“Yours most sincerely, 

“Walter Whitfield." 

The two looked at each other in amaze- 
ment. 

“Shall we go?” asked the grandfather, 
slowly. 

“Yes — oh, yes!” cried Edna, her eyes full 
of joy. “It’s a gift from the sea, grandpa — 
truly a gift from the sea. We will use it as 
Mr. Whitfield advises. We will go before 
winter settles down. And oh, grandpa, 
dear grandpa! At last you shall have your 
spectacles, and lots of other things that you 
need so much. And we will lay some of the 
money away in the bank, for surely in a 
large town like Key West there will be plenty 
of work for me to do to earn our living. Don’t 
you think it will be nice, grandpa?” 

“Yes, little girl.” Grandpa’s dim eyes were 
wet as he looked at the eager face. “We will 
go, and you shall have a chance for some 
schooling. Thank God, we have found a 
friend in whose care I can safely leave you 
when it is time for me to cross the bar!” 


VIII. 


HONOR AMONG NEWSBOYS. 

HERE are thousands of newsboys on 
the streets of our large cities who 
are living under the most unfavor- 
able conditions. Many of them 
know nothing of the comforts of home and 
nothing of a mother’s care. Raised on the 
street almost from the time they are old 
enough to walk, they often grow up in filth 
and wretchedness. An effort is being put 
forth in most of our cities now to improve 
their condition. But they are not all bad. 
The following incident, related in llie par- 
lance of the street, shows that they often 
have a high grade of honor among them- 
selves : 

A gentleman motioning to a newsboy, said, 
“Here, boy, let me have a paper. Here’s 
your penny.” 

“Can’t.” 

“Why not? I heard you crying them loud 
enough to be heard at the City Hall.” 



62 


HONOR AMONG NEWSBOYS 


63 


“Yes, but that was down t’other block, ye 
know, where I hollered.” 

“What does that matter? Come, now, no 
fooling. I’m in a hurry.” 

“Couldn’t sell you a paper on this here 
block, mister, cos it b’longs to Limpy. He’s 
just up the furdest end now. You’ll meet 
him.” 

“And who is Limpy? And why does he 
have this block?” 

“Cos us other boys agreed to let him have 
it. Ye see it’s a good run, ’count of the 
offices all along, and the poor chap is that 
lame he can’t get around lively like the rest 
of us, so we agreed that the first one caught 
sellin’ on his beat should be thrashed. See?” 

“Yes, I see. You have a sort of brother- 
hood among yourselves ?” 

“Well, we’re goin’ to look out for a little 
cove what’s lame, anyhow.” 

“There comes Limpy now. He’s a for- 
tunate boy to have such friends.” 

The gentleman bought two papers of him, 
and went on his way down town, wondering 
how many men in business would refuse to 
sell their wares in order to give a weak, halt- 
ing brother a chance in the field. 


IX. 


LARGEST CLOCK ON EARTH. 

AYOK WITTPEN, of Jersey City, re 
cent ly touched an electric button 
that set in motion a clock on the 
roof of a well-known soap factory, 
which is the largest timepiece in the world. 
The dial is thirty-eight feet across, the 
hour hand is fifteen feet long and the minute 
hand twenty feet long, and with its counter 
poise weighs nearly a third of a ton, while 
the machinery that moves it weighs two thou- 
sand pounds. At night the hands are out- 
lined with incandescent lights, red lights 
marking each numeral and the incandescent 
lamps each minute mark. The tip end of 
the minute lmnd travels twenty-four inches 
every minute. 

There have been many curious clocks in 
the history of the world, from the first one 
introduced into Europe, when the famous 
Eastern caliph, Haroun-al-Raschid, present- 
ed a wonderful clock to Charlemagne. In the 



64 


LARGEST CLOCK ON EARTH 


65 


dial of it were twelve small doors forming 
the divisions for the hours. Each door 
opened at the hour marked by the index and 
let out small brass balls, which, falling on 
a bell, struck the hours. 

The famous clock in the Cathedral of 
Strasburg is the standard of time for many of 
the cities of the world. It was built in 1439, 
and when Isaac Habrecht, its maker, died it 
ran down and was dead for two hundred 
years, because no one knew how to make it 
go. It was started again in 1681. A figure 
of Time, in a niche on one side, strikes the 
quarter hours from twelve to one, and four 
figures — Childhood, Youth, Manhood and Old 
Age — pass slowly before him. In a niche 
on the other side is an angel turning an 
nour-glass. 

But there is no clock in the world so large 
as the one lately started, which looks out 
upon the Hudson river. It will tell the 
children when to go to school, the laboring 
man when to begin his work, the house- 
keeper when to prepare her meals, the ships 
and trains the time to start. If the behold- 
ers will look with keen enough eyes, they will 
discover Time measuring off the little space 
to them and an angel with an hour-glass in 


66 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


his hand, and they will be inspired to dili- 
gence and the right use of every opportunity 
and a preparation for the eternal life where 
time shall be no more. “And the angel sware 
by Him that liveth forever and ever, that 
there should be time no longer” (Kev. 10:6). 


X. 


BOY WANTED. 

EOPLE laughed when they saw the 
sign again. It seemed to be always 
in Mr. Peters’ window. For a day 
or two — sometimes only for an hour 
or two — it would be missing, and passersby 
would wonder whether Mr. Peters had at 
last found a boy to suit him; but sooner 
or later it was sure to appear again. 

“What sort of a boy does he want, any- 
way ?” one and another would ask ; and then 
they would say they supposed he was looking 
for a perfect boy, and in their opinion he 
would look a great while before he found 
one. 

“All he wants is for a fellow to run er- 
rands; it must be easy work and sure pay” 
— this was the way they talked; but Mr. 
Peters wanted something more than a boy 
to run errands. John Simmons found it out, 
and this is the way he did it. He had been 
engaged that very morning, and had been 



67 


68 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


kept busy all the forenoon at pleasant enough 
work ; and although he was a lazy fellow, he 
rather enjoyed the place. 

It was toward the middle of the afternoon 
that he was sent up to the attic, a dark, 
dingy place, inhabited by mice and spiders. 

“You will find a long, deep box there/’ said 
Mr. Peters, “which I want to have put in 
order. It stands right in the middle of the 
room — you can’t miss it.” 

John looked doleful. “A long, deep box! 
I should think it was!” he said to himself, 
as the attic door closed after him. “It will 
weigh a ton, I guess; and what is there in 
it? Nothing in the world but old nails and 
screws and pieces of iron and broken keys 
and things — rubbish, the whole of it. Noth- 
ing worth touching. And it is as dark as 
a pocket up here, and cold besides. How 
the wdnd blows in through those knot-holes ! 
There’s a mouse! If there is anything I 
hate, it’s mice! I’ll tell you what it is, if 
Peters thinks I’m going to stay up here and 
tumble over his old, rusty nails, he’s much 
mistaken. I wasn’t hired for that kind of 
work.” 

Whereupon John bounced down the attic 
stairs three at a time, and was found loung- 


BOY WANTED 


69 


ing in the sliow-window an hour afterward 
when Mr. Peters appeared. 

“Have you put the box in order already ?” 
was the gentleman’s question. 

“I didn’t find anything to put in order; 
there was nothing in it but old nails and 
things.” 

Precisely at six o’clock John was called 
and paid the sum promised him for a day’s 
work ; and then, to his dismay, was told that 
his services would not be needed any more. 
He asked no questions. Indeed, he had no 
time for any, as Mr. Peters immediately 
closed the door. 

It was Crawford Mills who was hired next. 
He did not know the other boy, and so did 
his errands in blissful ignorance of the long 
box until the second morning of his stay, 
when, in a leisure hour, he was sent to put 
it in order. The morning passed, dinner time 
came, and still Crawford had not appeared 
from the attic. At last Mr. Peters called 
him, and said, “Got through ?” 

“No, sir, there is ever so much more to do.” 

“All right. It is dinner time now. You 
may go back to it after dinner.” 

After dinner he went back. All the short 
afternoon he was not heard from, but just 


70 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


as Mr. Peters was deciding to call him again 
he appeared. 

“I’ve done my best, sir/’ he said, “and down 
at the very bottom of the box I found this.” 

“This” was a five-dollar gold piece. 

“That’s a queer place for gold,” said Mr. 
Peters. “It’s good you found it. Well, sir, 
I suppose you will be on hand to-morrow 
morning?” 

This he said as he was putting the gold 
piece in his pocketbook. 

After Crawford had said good-night and 
gone, Mr. Peters took the lantern and went 
slowly up the attic stairs. There was the 
long, deep box in which the rubbish of 
twenty-five years had gathered. Crawford 
had evidently been to the bottom. He had 
fitted shingles to make compartments, and in 
these different rooms he had placed the ar- 
ticles with bits of shingle laid on top and 
labeled thus: “Good Screws,” “Picture 
Nails,” “Small Keys, Somewhat Bent,” “Pic- 
ture Hooks,” “Pieces of Iron,” and so on 
through the long box. In perfect order it was 
at last, and very little that really could be 
called useful could be found within it. 

But Mr. Peters, as he bent over and read 
the labels, laughed gleefully, and murmured 


BOY WANTED 


71 


to the mice : “It we are not both mistaken, 
I have found a boy ; and he has found a for- 
tune.” 

Sure enough; the sign disappeared from 
the window, and was seen no more. 

All this happened years ago. Crawford 
Mills is errand boy no more — the firm is 
Peters, Mills & Co., — a young man and a 
rich man. 

“He found his fortune in the long box of 
rubbish,” Mr. Peters said once, laughing. 
“Never was a five-dollar gold piece so suc- 
cessful in business as that one of his has 
been ; it is good he found it.” 

Then, after a moment of silence, he said, 
gravely : “No, he didn’t ; he found it in his 
mother’s Bible — ‘He that is faithful in that 
which is least, is faithful also in much.’ It 
is true; Mills, the boy, was ‘faithful,’ and 
Mills, the man, we trust.” 


XI. 


AN ENGLISH STORY. 

OMETHING less than three hundred 
years ago, a poorly-dressed, awk- 
ward boy of seventeen was seen 
traveling on foot in southern Eng- 
land. He was barefooted, but in his hands 
he carried a pair of heavy shoes, while at the 
end of a stick over his shoulders was a 
bundle of books and clothing. This was all 
the property he had in the world, with the 
exception of a few silver pieces in an old 
leather purse in his pocket, given him by his 
mother, as she bade him good-by at the door 
of their poor little cottage in sunny Devon- 
shire. But Jack — that was the lad’s name — 
walked on whistling merrily, thinking little 
of the queer figure he presented, and wonder- 
ing how long it would be before he reached 
his journey’s end, for he had already travel- 
ed two hundred miles, and was footsore, 
dusty and weary. 

Suddenly the tramping of horses’ feet and 



72 



AN ENGLISH STORY 


73 


the jingling of many spurs and swords 
sounded just before him, and turning sharply 
round a corner of the road, a mounted troop 
cantered up. There were some thirty horse- 
men, all dressed in gay doublets and slashed 
hose and big boots and long plumes, who 
drew rein as their leader halted his steed 
directly in front of the bare-foot, shambling, 
boyish figure. 

“Well, lad, what is thy name?” asked the 
cavalier, with a broad Scotch accent. 

Jack looked up and saw a figure quite as 
ridiculous as his own — a middle-sized, full- 
bearded, goggle-eyed man, whose rickety, 
awkward person seemed all the queerer 
dressed in thick padded clothes of a grass- 
green color, with a hunting horn dangling at 
his side instead of a sword, and his hat and 
feather sticking over his eye. He did not 
know who the speaker was. Any of the cav- 
aliers would have told him that it was 
James Stuart, by the grace of God King of 
Great Britain and Ireland. But the boy took 
off his ragged cap and answered respectfully 
enough : 

“John Prideaux, sir, and I am going to Ox- 
ford.” “And what wilt thou do at Oxford, 
mon lad?” 


74 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


“I wish to be a scholar, sir,” replied Jack, 
his cheeks flushing in spite of himself. “A 
scholar ! That is goot,” said King James, ap- 
provingly. “But what, mon lad, wilt thou 
do with thine scholarship?” 

“I may be a bishop some day,” declared the 
boy, defiantly. At this bold speech several of 
the cavaliers laughed rudely. “Thou a 
bishop! Ha! ha!” 

But the king, who was wise in some 
things, restrained them. “Stranger things 
have happened, mon gentles,” he said. 
“There was once an English butcher who 
had a son who became a cardinal, and ruled 
this broad realm of England like a king. If 
Wolsey was so high, why may not this boy be 
some day a bishop?” 

Then turning to the wondering lad, he con- 
tinued : “Thou hast an honest face, and thy 
mouth hath determination. Thou wilt suc- 
ceed, I ween. When thou hast thine scholar- 
ship, come to me, and I will have a bishopric 
for thee.” The green-suited cavalier spurred 
on, and the whole troop followed, leaving the 
amazed lad standing in the dusty highway 
gazing after them. 

“That must be the king,” he thought. 

“Well, I will try and not disappoint 111111.” 


AN ENGLISH STORY 


75 


And he trudged on again with a hopeful 
heart. 

That night he slept on the sheltered side 
of a hay-stack, his only supper being a bit 
of bread and a cup of milk that he begged 
of a farmer’s wife. The following day he 
arrived at the splendid city of Oxford, his 
feet sore and his spirits depressed, and 
scarcely knowing what to do. He had heard 
of Exeter College, Oxford, and thither he 
went, and to his great delight was engaged 
by the cook as a scullion — that is, to carry 
wood and coal into the kitchen, to clean pans 
and kettles and to do similar work. 

And how was a scullion ever to become a 
bishop? John Prideaux did not exactly 
know, but he kept on working and studying. 
First of all, he would be a scholar. While 
he scoured the pans and kettles he would 
have a book open before him, and while he 
was carrying coal he would say over and 
over what he had learned, to fix it in his 
mind. In this way he made slow but sure 
progress, though sometimes he felt almost 
discouraged, and often wished that he had 
stayed at home with his brothers in the little 
Devon village. 

“If I could only have been the parish clerk 


76 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


at Ugborough, I would not be here among 
the black pots and kettles/’ he thought. For 
the poor lad, at the death of the old clerk of 
his native parish, had hoped to fill his place, 
but was disappointed. 

As there were six brothers and five sisters 
of them, Jack felt that he could no longer 
be a burden to his parents, and so he set out 
to get a living elsewhere. At the city of 
Exeter, where he first went, he had met with 
no success, but as he looked on the beautiful 
cathedral and in the bookseller’s windows, a 
strong desire sprang up in his mind to be- 
come a scholar. So he started off at once for 
Oxford. And there at the great university 
he was only a scullion. 

Jack had no need to be discouraged. If 
he had been parish clerk at Ugborough he 
never could have become a bishop, and now 
he had everything before him. 

One day one of the great teachers hap- 
pened to go into the kitchen where Jack was 
scrubbing away on a large iron pan, with his 
book as usual open before him. “What book 
is that you are so intent on reading?” asked 
the learned man. 

“Plato’s Dialogues, sir,” answered Jack, 
continuing his scouring. 


AN ENGLISH STORY 


77 


“What, do you read Greek?” inquired the 
surprised professor. “Yes, a little, sir,” he 
replied, blushing. “This is no place for you, 
then. You shall not stay here.” 

The learned man kept his word. Jack was 
admitted into the college as a poor scholar, 
and his wants provided for. He studied hard, 
and soon was at the head of his class. In 
three years the freckle-faced, shambling- 
gaited, awkward youth, who had walked all 
the way over the weary road from Exeter to 
Oxford, wore the scholar’s cap, and had 
taken a bachelor’s degree. 

King James was at Whitehall holding 
court at the Christmas festivities, when he 
was informed that a young gentleman desired 
to see him. The king went into the waiting 
room, and the visitor was ushered into his 
presence with the usual ceremony. “What 
is thine errand, mon?” asked James, who 
did not at first recognize his caller. 

“I have come for my bishopric,” answered 
Jack, a sudden gleam flashing from his 
deep, earnest eyes. 

“Odds zook! Master Prideaux, and thou 
shalt have it,” cried the king. 

And any one may read for himself in his- 
tory how the learned Dr. John Prideaux, 


78 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


who had been a poor scullion boy at Oxford 
University, lived and worked many years as 
the able and excellent Bishop of Worcester. 


XII. 


THE BOY INSIDE THE CLOTHES. 


S Y BOY, come here a moment, I want 
to see how you look.” Ralph 
stepped into the library, where his 
Aunt Anna was sitting. He was 
generally rather afraid of her keen eyes, but 
just now he was ready for school, and knew 
that, for once, his tie was straight, his shoes 
tied, and his clothes above reproach. 

Aunt Anna held him off at arm’s length, 
and looked him over carefully. “Well, you 
really are very neat!” she exclaimed, laugh- 
ing, “but, oh dear, it won’t last long! I 
know you’ll come home looking like a little 
scarecrow.” 

The keeping of his clothes tidy was the 
problem of Ralph’s life. “I can’t help it,” 
he said, desperately. “Things get dirty them- 
selves.” 

Aunt Anna laughed again. “Run and show 
yourself to your mother,” she said, “she 
won’t know vou.” 


79 



80 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


Ralph found his mother in the sewing-room. 
“Good-by, dearie,” she said, “keep your 
clothes tidy, son.” 

“Oh, that’s what everybody’s always say- 
ing to me,” groaned Ralph. “I don’t know 
why I always get things into a muss.” 

His mother looked into the boy’s troubled 
face. She knew he did fry sometimes to 
keep himself tidy. “Well, son,” she said, 
gently, “you know I would like very much 
if you could learn to be more careful, but 
there’s something far more important. Keep 
the boy inside of the clothes clean and hon- 
est, and mother won’t mind so very much if 
your clothes are soiled.” 

Ralph ran off, feeling much comforted. He 
really intended to make a special effort this 
time to come home from school looking re- 
spectable. But, as usual he forgot all about 
his clothes before he reached the school-house. 
They were called to his mind very suddenly 
however, just before recess. Ralph’s geog- 
raphy was torn; his books, like his clothes, 
were generally out of repair. Ted Hammond, 
who sat opposite, offered him his, and in 
reaching for the book Ralph upset his ink- 
bottle. He did not notice the fact at the 
moment, and swept his arm through the black 


THE BOY INSIDE THE CLOTHES 


81 


stream, sending it spattering over his new 
tie and his spotless suit. 

Ralph hung his head in shame, as the 
giggles passed up and down the rows of 
spectators. He was thinking that Aunt An- 
na would say it was just as she expected; 
and his mother would be disappointed again. 

But he forgot all about his trouble at re- 
cess, and his condition was not at all im- 
proved by the play-time. Ralph lived some 
distance from the school, and did not go 
home at noon; so by the time the hour for 
closing school drew near, the tidy, spotless 
boy, who had set out from home, was quite 
what his Aunt Anna would have called “a 
little scarecrow.” 

In the middle of the afternoon the room 
received a joyful surprise. Mr. Evans, the 
principal, walked into their midst. Mr. 
Evans had a big sailing yacht on the river, 
and had long been promising the boys of 
Ralph’s grade a trip. Every one sat up very 
straight, as he entered ; the time had surely 
come. 

“Well, boys,” he said, his eyes twinkling 
at the sight of the eager faces, “I think it’s 
time for that sail down the river, don’t you ?” 

“Yes, sir,” came like one great voice from 


82 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


twenty throats. Mr. Evans laughed. “The 
breeze is just favorable to-day, and Miss Wil- 
son says you may come at half -past three ; so 
you see, that will give you a little holiday 
too. You have a grammar lesson yet, and 
your teacher says all those who are perfect 
may come with me, and all those who are 
not must stay and study. Now, do vour 
best, because I want every one of you.” 

Ralph’s heart sank, as the principal left 
the room, and he could not join the joyful 
applause. Next to keeping himself tidy, 
grammar was his worst difficulty. He felt 
there would be very little chance for him. 

Miss Wilson was already assigning the 
lesson; there were four rules to be written 
out. He sat and chewed his pen in despair. 
Try as he would, only one rule would come 
into his head; and he sat staring fiercely at 
his blank sheet of paper. 

Ted Hammond was watching him. Gram- 
mar was as easy for Ted as playing ball, and 
he finished his four rules in about four min- 
utes and handed them to Miss Wilson. Sud- 
denly he seized another piece of paper, and 
scribbled upon it rapidly. Miss Wilson 
passed down the aisle collecting papers. 
When her back was turned Ted shoved the 


THE BOY INSIDE THE CLOTHES 


sheet upon Ralph’s desk. Ralph opened it. 
There were the four rules written in Ted’s 
sprawling hand, and underneath was writ- 
ten, “Copy these quick, or you'll miss the 
sail.” Ralph’s heart leaped ! What a chance! 
He had almost given up hope, now he reached 
for his pen ; but as he did so, his eye caught 
sight of the inky streaks on his sleeve. He 
looked down at his soiled clothes, and his 
mother’s parting words came to him,— “Keep 
the boy inside the clothes clean and honest.” 
Certainly he was a disreputable looking ob- 
ject on the outside, and now he was going to 
make matters far worse by soiling his char- 
acter. It wouldn’t be “clean and honest” 
to copy those rules ; and yet, oh, how he did 
want to go on that sail ! Nothing would de- 
light him more! 

He struggled for just a moment; then he 
took his pen and wrote across the paper, “No, 
thanks, it would be sneaky.” When Ted re- 
ceived the paper he stared. “You’re a big 
silly,” he whispered, as the bell rang, and 
the successful ones passed out. 

As they clattered joyfully down the stair, 
poor Ralph sat struggling with his lesson, 
and thinking how much better the breezy 
sail would be than the hot school-room. He 


84 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


was beginning to feel that doing right was a 
very hard thing. 

Matters did not improve when he reached 
home. Aunt Anna met him in the hall. “Oh, 
Ralph Rogers !” she gasped, “was there ever 
such an untidy boy? Just look at him!” she 
cried to Ralph’s mother, who had just en- 
tered. Mrs. Rogers looked down at her inky, 
muddy son gravely. She had hoped that 
Ralph would really try to be tidy this time. 

“Perhaps the boy inside the clothes is all 
right, though,” she said, encouragingly. Ralph 
looked up at her gratefully ; he was too much 
of a man to tell of his honest deed, but he 
felt a thrill of gladness that he was not 
ashamed to look into his mother’s eyes. 

But a wonderful surprise awaited him the 
next morning. As he ran downstairs, neat 
and tidy once more, he found his mother and 
aunt waiting for him in the hall. Mrs. Rog- 
ers held in her hand a piece of paper that 
somehow looked familiar to Ralph. She 
kissed him with tears in her eyes. “Look, 
dear,” she said, “Miss Wilson called with 
this; she found it on the school-room floor. 
I am very proud of you, Ralph!” 

Ralph’s face grew hot, but his heart swelled 
with happiness. What a good thing it was 


THE BOY INSIDE THE CLOTHES 


85 


to be honest, after all ! There was his writ- 
ten refusal to do wrong. 

“And Ralphie,” cried his aunt, “Miss Wil- 
son told Mr. Evans you had lost the sail for 
the sake of your honor, and he is going to 
take you on the yacht this afternoon. And 
you may come home looking like a little 
tramp if you like,” she added, laughing, “and 
Aunt Anna won’t scold you one little bit!” 


XIII. 


1I0W HE CAME OUT AHEAD. 


’VE just run in to tell you, Jack,” said 
a neighbor living nearby, “that I've 
heard Mr. Marvin wants a boy to 
help him in his garden this summer.” 

“Ho!” said Jack, in excited interest. 

“That’s what I’ve been told. And I 
thought of you at once — ” 

“Thank you,” said Jack, fervently. 

“And I came right over to tell you because 
1 knew Ben Johnson and Day Ford were 
going to try for the place this morning and 
I thought you’d like to be looking out early.” 

“Go right off,” said Jack’s mother, who 
had come to listen to what was being said. 

“I will at once,” said Jack, and in a sur- 
prisingly short time he was ready to go, and 
with a kiss and smile to his mother, mingled 
with a very earnest, very hasty “Oh — if only !” 
lie set off with a pace made up of walk, run 
and jump, all the way thinking hard to him- 
self of the many reasons for which it would 

8(5 



HOW HE CAME OUT AHEAD 


87 


l»e so very delightful if lie could get the sum- 
mer’s work from Mr. Marvin. 

“First, I must do something, that’s settled. 
Mother can’t support a great fellow like me, 
even if I’d let her, which I wouldn’t. Second, 
I shall be obliged to do something out of 
doors because of these troublesome eyes of 
mine. Third, I want something to do near 
home. If I don’t get it I shall have to go 
out on a farm away from mother.” Jack 
gave a higher jump and started off on a new 
run. 

Half an hour or less brought him very 
near to the place which every one acknowl- 
edged to be the finest and prettiest in the 
country neighborhood. Already he could see 
the gleam of the sun on the green house 
and the waving of the vines climbing over the 
front veranda. The sight made his blood 
tingle a little faster, for he was a true flower 
lover and greatly longed to be at work among 
the beautiful things beautifully kept. 

But before arriving at the lane which led 
up to Mr. Marvin’s house, he heard sounds 
of distress and stopped his swift progress to 
cross the road and see what was the trouble 
on the other side. 

Trouble enough. There was an overturned 


88 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


baby carriage and a crying baby on the 
ground near it. Three or four broken flower 
pots mingled with the plants which had been 
in them. And there was an old lady seated 
on the ground looking quite as distressed as 
the baby, though she made much less noise. 
She was white haired and pleasant faced 
and looked as if she thought she needed help 
very much, as she certainly did. 

“What is the matter, ma’am?” asked Jack, 
scarcely taking time to lift his hat before 
picking up the baby. 

“Well, a good deal, it seems to me,” she 
said, smiling a little. “Oh, now, baby, you’re 
not hurt. You needn’t cry any more.” “You 
see,” she went on to Jack as he coaxed the 
baby into quiet, “I wanted to bring these 
flowers to one of my neighbors. They are 
choice — Oh, I’m sorry to see them broken — ’ 
and I told my daughter-in-law I’d carry them 
in the baby carriage and give baby a ride at 
the same time. And I don’t know how it 
happened, but I can’t see as well as I used 
to, and I turned my foot on a root and in 
trying to save myself gave the carriage a jerk 
and over it went — Oh, he’s got a bump, poor- 
baby.” 

Jack felt a little overwhelmed at such a 


HOW HE CAME OUT AHEAD 


89 


heaping up of disaster. He looked around, 
hoping to see some one who might help, but 
no one was in sight. 

“What shall I do first ?” he asked, after 
setting the baby on the ground and giving 
him some trinkets out of his pocket to play 
with. 

“Well, if you’ll run to that little spring 
down there and wet this handkerchief to 
tie around his forehead, and these flowers 
must be seen to or they’ll die. Will you go 
to that house and borrow a pail to bring some 
water to keep the roots wet? And then — 
but do that first, please.” 

Poor Jack communed despairingly with 
himself as he hurried with all his might for 
water. 

“I never knew before that a boy could be 
so pulled two ways. Of course, I can’t leave 
anybody in such a fix. But — there’s Mr. 
Marvin’s — Ben and Day will be ahead of 
me and one of them will get the place. Per- 
haps this is all she’ll want me to do. Perhaps 
some one else will be along — ” 

But Jack soon found that what he was 
expected to do would not admit of his soon 
getting away. Baby objected to the bandage 
and it took time to get it on. Then the old 


‘JO 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


lady was particular about what should be 
done with the flowers. They were to be care- 
fully packed at the foot of a tree until some 
one could be sent for them. 

“Well, I guess it’s no use, IT1 be too late. 7 ’ 
But not once did Jack entertain the idea of 
leaving a lady, an old lady, too, and a child, 
to shift for themselves when he could help 
them. Very carefully he handled the flowers, 
even in his regret taking note of their beauty, 
wishing with all his heart that his days might 
be spent at such work. The old lady, being 
at length satisfied that they had been well 
cared for, began to think of herself. “Do 
you live near here?” she asked. 

“Not very,” said Jack. 

“Perhaps you are in a hurry to get home?" 

“No,” said Jack. lie knew there was no 
hurry now. One or other of the boys must 
have been hired and everything fixed by this 
lime. Well, he couldn’t help it. Tf he had 
to go off on a farm where he could see mother 
only once a week or so it was not his fault, 
lie had lost no time in trying to secure this 
most desirable thing — with every moment of 
1 bought Jack realized more and more how 
he had longed for it. 

“Well,” went on the white-haired lady, “as 


HOW HE CAME OUT AHEAD 


91 


you’re not in a hurry — I don’t know, I'm 
sure, what 1 should have done if you hadn’t 
come along this way — I’ll get you to wheel 
the baby home, and — do you know how to 
harness a horse ? If you do, it will be a great 
help to me.” 

“Yes, ma’am,” said Jack. 

“The hired man is away this morning, so 
I’ll ask you to do it. But I really am afraid 
I shall be keeping you too long. Were you 
going far?” 

“No’m,” said Jack. “I’m not going any- 
where. Fact is,” he went on, encouraged by 
the pleasant smile and the kindness in the 
eyes under the white hair, “I was going to 
ask Mr. Marvin about the place to help about 
the garden. But some other boys were going 
so they’ve got ahead of me. I’m real glad,” 
he honestly added, ‘‘that I came along just 
in time to help you.” 

“You want to work for Mr. Marvin? Well, 
you go up that lane and find somebody at 
the house who will show you the horse and 
buggy.” 

“Up there?” Jack pointed toward Mr. 
Marvin’s house. 

“Yes, but stop — here is my son coming. 
James,” she went on, as a gentleman came 


92 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


down the lane, “have you hired any one to 
help the gardener?” 

“No. I have had two or three applications 
— some boys were here before breakfast, but 
I haven’t given any one a decided answer.” 

“I am glad of that. Here is a boy who 
appears to be the kind we like to have about 
the place. He thought he was losing his 
chance in stopping to help me when I needed 
it, but it sometimes happens, you know,” 
again with the kindly smile at Jack, “that 
people who forget to look out for themselves 
come out best after all. Now, James — I 
thought I should need the buggy, but you can 
give me your arm up the lane.” 

Jack wheeled the baby, his heart dancing 
and his eyes beaming at sight of the flowers 
on every side as he came near the house. 
Half an hour later he was on his way home 
to tell of being hired by Mr. Marvin for the 
summer. 


THE WAY TO HEAVEN. 


EAKS ago little boys were employed 
by the chimney-sweeps of London 
to go up and down the tall chimneys 
where men could not go. They were 
often seen in the streets of London with their 
smutty rig, their kit of brushes, and their 
song, “Sweep-o-sweep,” ringing through the 
air. 

One morning a gentleman met one of these 
begrimed youngsters. 

“Show me the way to Hyde Park, little 
smut, and I’ll give you a penny,” he said. 

“Oh, yes, sir,” said the boy, “and I’ll tell 
you the way to another place for another 
penny.” 

“Where is that?” 

“The way to heaven, sir.” 

The gentleman, surprised, said, “Tell me; 
I’ll give you a penny.” 

“Jesus Christ is the way, sir, and I know 
it is true, because He says so Himself.” 



94 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


The gentleman was so pleased that he 
gave the child a sixpence. 

“Fll buy a pie,” he said. “It will be good.” 

But he had no sooner bought it than he* 
thought, “If I eat this pie it will be gone, 
and no good to anybody.” He went right 
back to ,the shop and asked the woman to 
take the pie and give him his money again. 
She smiled, but did not object. 

Out he started again, and now to a store 
where books and tracts were sold. He asked 
the bookseller to give him a sixpence worth 
of little books. “Pretty ones,” he said, “with 
pictures on them.” 

“Where did you get your sixpence?” he 
was asked. 

“A gentleman gave it to me.” 

“Did he give it to you, sure?” asked the 
man, looking at him very sharply. 

“Yes, sir, he gave it to me for telling him 
the way to heaven, and I’ll tell you if you’ll 
give me a sixpence,” 

“I will ; tell me.” 

“Jesus Christ is the way, sir, and I’m sure 
it’s true, because He says so,” was the reply. 

The man was delighted with the answer 
and paid the sixpence, and a more happy boy 
never trod the streets of London than was 


THE WAY TO HEAVEN 


f)5 


our sweep with his shilling's worth of pretty 
booklets. 

The first person he met he spoke to. 

“Will you have one of my books, sir?” 

The gentleman spoken to was so surprised 
to see a little sweep giving away tracts that 
he had to stop to inquire into the matter. 

“Where did you get them?” he asked. 

“I bought them, sir.” 

“Where did you get the money?” 

“I told two men the way to heaven.” 

The answer surprised this man as much 
as it had others. 

“Will you tell me?” he asked. 

“Yes, sir; Jesus Christ says, T am the 
way,’ and it must be so, because He said so.” 

The gentleman was so pleased that he re- 
plied, “Come to see me to-morrow,” and tak- 
ing a card out of his pocket he wrote some- 
thing on it for the boy. 

The next day the little sweep-o,‘with his 
brushes, went to the gentleman’s home and 
said, “I have come to sweep your chimney.” 

“No, you don’t,” said the servant crossly ; 
“go away.” 

“But the master told me to come,” and 
feeling in his pocket he pulled out the card 
and gave it to the man. 


96 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


The servant went to his master to see what 
it meant, and the next thing our little boy 
was admitted, not to go up the chimney, but 
into the library to see the gentleman of the 
house. 

The result was that his clothes were 
changed and he was sent to school. 

Now he is engaged in telling to all who 
will hear the way to heaven. 


XV. 


HINGES. 

F COURSE, I can take care of them,” 
said Jennie, with a little toss of her 
bright head. “Grandma needs you, 
Aunt Beth; you see the children 
are contented with me.” 

She tossed a rubber ball to Claire as she 
spoke, and turned to catch the ball that 
Clyde’s little hands were uncertainly trying 
to throw to her. The mother looked from the 
sweet, girlish face to the laughing babies. 

“Oh, yes ! I can trust them with you, dear, 
and I’m glad I can go. I do not know any 
one else I’d be so willing to leave them with. 
Good-by.” 

Jennie watched the carriage roll away, but 
her little charges clamored for her attention 
and drew her from the window. She felt 
quite matronly and dignified as she looked 
around the beautiful room and reflected that 
she was to be the mistress of the place until 
the next day. Aunt Beth’s home and twin 



97 


98 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


babies were her admiration, and she was 
quite proud of the little ones’ devotion to 
her. 

Late in the afternoon the door bell rang 
and a young friend was ushered in. 

“Oh!” laughed Jennie, jumping up from 
the construction of a block-house. “I heard 
the bell, but I thought it was some caller 
for Aunt Beth, who would go away as so 
many have done before.” 

“No; I came to see you,” said her friend. 
“I went to your house and found you were 
here; I want you to go with me to the art 
gallery. There is a beautiful painting which 
is to be taken away in the morning. It is 
only here for to-day and we must see it. Run 
and get your hat, for we will not have more 
than time to go and get back before tea; so 
hurry, please.” 

Jennie’s picture-loving eyes brightened; 
then she paused. 

“But I can’t go, Madge. I’m staying with 
the children, you see.” 

“Nonsense !” answered Madge, impatiently. 
“Why, you are going to be here all night, 
aren’t you? And you needn’t be gone more 
than an hour and a half. You will be back 
in plenty of time to ‘tuck them in their little 


HINGES 


09 


bed/ and all that sort of thing. Can’t Susan 
take care of them?” 

“I’ll be busy in the dining room, but I can 
leave the door open, and we can get along 
for a little while if Miss Jennie wants to 
go,” said Susan, rather slowly. She was 
putting coal on the lire, and felt that the 
visitor waited for her to speak. 

“There!” cried Madge, triumphantly. “Now 
get your hat. Their own mother leaves them 
sometimes.” 

“She wouldn’t have left them to-day if she 
hadn’t thought I would be here,” Jennie 
urged. “It might be all right, Madge, and I 
do want to see the picture, but — I couldn’t 
feel comfortable about going.” 

She would not be persuaded, though Madge 
called her an exaggerated conscience, and 
finally departed, vexed and disappointed. 
Jennie, too, was disappointed. She had 
heard of the picture before, and had hoped 
to see it some time. Besides, it did seem a 
scant return for all the trouble her friend 
had taken to let her go alone. The thought of 
seeming unkind troubled Jennie. The chil- 
dren played as contentedly with their box of 
toys as if they were quite capable of amusing 
themselves, and perhaps they would scarcely 


100 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


have missed her. She took up a book and 
tried to forget her annoyance in reading. 

Suddenly a slight sound, she scarcely knew 
what, drew her attention to the children, 
and with a quick cry she sprang from her seat 
and caught the little boy from the floor. The 
boy was choking. The little face was purple, 
and the bright marbles scattered over the 
carpet told what had happened. Her cry 
brought Susan, but the frightened girl no 
sooner comprehended the trouble than she 
turned and ran out of the house and down the 
street for a doctor. Four blocks for help; 
the hopelessness of it flashed through Jen- 
nie’s mind as she heard the door close and 
felt herself alone in the frantic efforts she 
had been making from the first warning. 
She tossed the child, she swung him for- 
ward and downward, and then, just as it 
seemed as if he must die, the marble flew 
from his throat, and he fell back limply in 
Jennie’s arms. 

It was over in scarcely more time than 
it takes for the telling. It was only one of 
those “almosts” that lie so thickly along the 
path of daily life — the things that nearly 
happened, but did not quite, and so speedily 
forgotten. The color was coming back to 


HINGES 


101 


Clyde’s face, and he was crying a half -fright- 
ened, half-fretful cry by the time Susan had 
delivered her incoherent message and re- 
turned. When the doctor came, an hour 
later, both children were peacefully sleeping. 

“I was out of town and only came back a 
few minutes ago,” he said. “I couldn’t quite 
understand what was wrong from the word 
I received, but I came at once.” 

He was an old friend of the family, and 
Jennie explained, sure of ready sympathy. 

“What if I had not been here!” she said, 
as they looked at the two rosy sleepers. 

“But you were,” he answered, soothingly, 
noting the nervous tremor in her voice. 

“But I was tempted to go. It seems such 
a trivial neglect, if, indeed, it could be called 
neglect at all, and yet — how awfully great 
it would have looked to me all the rest of my 
life !” 

“Ah, yes; if you had gone. Everything in 
this world is a hinge upon which something 
else swings,” he said, thoughtfully. “And 
we never can be sure that any omitted duty 
will be a trifle.” 


XVI. 


A FULL PAIL. 


SAY there, boy, want to earn a 
nickel ?” Tommy Tolliver, the new 
errand boy at the factory, jumped 
to his feet. Want to earn a nickel ? 
Was there ever a boy who wanted it more? 
Tommy wondered. Had he not been study- 
ing the “Want” columns of the daily papers 
for weeks, in the hope of finding a job so 
that he could help his mother keep all the 
little Tollivers in food and clothing? 

“Just you run around the corner to Pat 
Ryan’s saloon and get this two-quart pail 
full of beer. Here’s the change. We’ll pay 
you the nickel when you come back,” said 
one of the group of men who sat eating their 
lunch in the corner of the room. 

Tommy’s face flushed, and instead of reach- 
ing out a willing hand for the extended pail, 
he clasped both hands behind him. 

“I can’t do it,” he said. 

“Why can’t you?” sneered one of the men. 



102 


A FULL PAIL 


103 


“You ain’t much of a boy if you can’t carry 
a two-quart pail of beer two short blocks.” 

“That’s just the trouble,” answered Tom- 
my, with a flash of the eye. “I’m a lot too 
strong to carry a two-quart pail of beer even 
one block. I’ve had enough of the stuff. If 
it hadn’t been for beer, I wouldn’t be work- 
ing here doing what my father ought to be 
doing, taking care of my mother and the 
children. I’d be in school like other boys.” 

The faces of the men clouded. “Who set 
you up to preach to us ? Don’t you know we 
can make it unpleasant for you here if we’re 
a mind to?” 

“I can’t help it,” replied the boy, firmly. 
“I can’t touch the stuff.” 

' “Say, sonny, you better do it this time,” 
counseled a good-natured young man, “or 
they’ll complain to the superintendent about 
everything you do.” 

“You’ll have to do it, that’s all there is 
to it,” said the first speaker. “The boss put 
you here to run our errands. So just you 
take that pail, and don’t you show up here 
again until it’s filled. Hear?” And the pail 
was thrust into the boy’s hand. 

Just outside the door Tommy hesitated for 
a second, thinking hard. 


104 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


“That man in there isn't the head man/’ 
he argued. “There are men away ahead of 
him. Of course, if it comes to the boss tell- 
ing me I’ve got to do it, I’ll have to hunt for 
a new place, but I’m not going to give up 
easy.” 

Straight around the corner went Tommy 
to the main entrance, up the broad steps to 
the elevator. The elevator boy directed him 
to the room where the president, vice-presi- 
dent, secretary and treasurer were holding 
an important meeting. 

Boldly Tommy knocked at the door and 
found himself facing a room full of prosper- 
ous-looking men; so prosperous, indeed, that 
Tommy glanced down with sudden shame at 
his own shabby garments. 

“Well, my boy, what’s the trouble?” asked 
the gentleman who seemed to be at the head 
of affairs. 

“I’m Tommy Tolliver, the new errand boy 
in the factory,” said Tommy, bravely. “I 
just came yesterday, and the men down there, 
they say I’ve just got to get this pail of beer 
or I’ll be dismissed quick. I came up here 
to find the real boss. Say, is it so? Have 
I got to carry their beer for them?” 

The man looked seriously down into the 


A FULL PAIL 


105 


boy’s anxious face, as he answered with an- 
other question: 

“ Suppose you have? What will you do 
about it, young man?” 

Quick as a flash the answer came back, in 
a respectful but spirited tone: 

“Do? I reckon there isn’t but one thing 
to do, and that’s to hunt another job. I’m 
not going into the beer business for any- 
body.” There was a subdued murmur of 
applause in the room. 

“Well, my boy, neither are we in the beer 
business, and I think it’s about time we had 
some rules posted up in our building con- 
cerning that very thing. What do you say ?” 
he asked, turning to the other gentlemen in 
the room. 

“I suggest that we draft such a notice im- 
mediately, have it written out on the type- 
writer, and put a copy in that pail and send 
it back by this young man. Then the men 
can’t say he didn’t bring back a full pail.” 

Before the day was over notices were 
posted all over the building forbidding the 
use of beer and liquor of all kinds on the 
premises. Neither did the president forget 
the new boy in the factory, but when a few 
weeks later a new office boy was needed in 


106 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


the head office, he sent word to the superin- 
tendent of the factory that he would like to 
have “the boy with the backbone” sent up to 
take the position. And although no name 
was mentioned, the superintendent smiled a 
knowing smile, and called out loud so that all 
could hear : 

“Tommy Tolliver, the president wants to 
see you in his office.” 


XVII. 


FRANK’S LESSON. 

RANK/’ said the head clerk to a 
young man in a large carpet estab- 
lishment, “take this roll of carpet 
over to Mr. Craft’s, and see whether 
the pattern will suit. You may just as well 
take a rule and measure the room while you 
are there. That will save one of the men 
going over.” 

' “All right,” replied Frank, putting on his 
coat and hat. But when he noticed the roll— 
a sample one, containing about five yards — 
he exclaimed, “You surely don’t expect me to 
carry that big roll, do you?” 

“It’s only a sample, and Mr. Craft is in 
a hurry for it,” replied the clerk. 

“But what are the boys here for? I think 
you might send one of them over with it. If 
there’s anything I detest, it’s carting bundles 
around town.” 

The proprietor, who happened to overhear 
part of the conversation, told the clerk 



107 


108 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


privately, to let the young man go and take 
the measurements, and to send the carpet 
after him. Frank had arrived at the house 
and was busy with his work when a man 
came to the door with a roll of carpet under 
his arm and was shown into the room where 
he was. Looking up, Frank was surprised 
to recognize his employer with the roll of 
carpet under his arm. 

“Here’s the carpet, young man. 1 hope 
I have not kept you waiting for it. If you 
have any other orders, I’ll take them now,” 
he said, as he put down the roll. The young 
man was so astonished he hardly knew what 
to say, and stood staring at his employer, 
who left the house with a polite bow. 

“Well, did you get the carpet this after- 
noon?” asked the clerk, laying his hand on 
the young man’s shoulder, when the latter 
returned. 

“Yes,” said Frank, looking up from his 
desk, “but do you know I cannot understand 
why Mr. Green brought it around. I was 
never more surprised in my life.” 

“Well, Mr. Green told me to ask you to 
step into his office when you returned.” 

“My boy,” said his employer, as he entered 
the office, “I overheard your conversation this 


frank's lesson 


109 


afternoon, and what I did was for your own 
benefit. A man should never be above bis 
business — that is, too proud to give personal 
attention to the smallest details. He should 
be prepared to perform any duty that comes 
legitimately, and to obey orders from those 
in authority. You should consider no part 
of a business too unimportant for you to 
give it attention. Fetch and carry for your- 
self rather than miss a single point or risk 
the loss of a customer. Never be above your 
business.” 


XVIII. 


KEEP YOUR EYE ON THE MAIN POINT. 

LAWYER advertised for a boy to be 
a clerk and a student in his office. 
The next morning his office was 
well tilled with applicants of all 
sorts, many, however, bright, capable boys. 
He arranged them in a row and then said: 
“Now, boys, I am going to tell you a story. 
Watch it carefully and then tell me what 
you think about it. 

“A certain farmer had some very choice 
seed corn which he was saving for his spring 
planting. A red squirrel kept stealing this 
corn. He set traps and tried in other ways 
to stop it, but in spite of all he could do, 
the depredation continued. He determined 
then to shoot the squirrel. 

“After many times of watching, one day he 
saw the squirrel just as he was going into 
the barn at a hole and he fired at him. 

“The wadding from his gun at the first 
shot set the barn on fire. The farmer, seizing 



no 



KEEP YOUR EYE ON THE MAIN POINT 111 


a pail, ran to the well for water and called 
his family to help put out the fire. A scream 
from the barn alarmed him and, rushing in, 
he found his little boy, who had been playing 
in the hay mow, had fallen to the floor. He 
immediately sent his older boy on horse back 
for the doctor, and the horse ran away and 
threw the boy off. They had no pump in 
their well, but drew out the water with a 
rope. , In the excitement of drawing water, 
the hired girl fell into the well, and the 
grandmother, hearing the screams of the girl, 
rushed out and fell off the high, back porch, 
and — well, there is more to it, but what do 
you make out of the story?” 

“Did the barn burn down?” asked one of 
the boys. 

“Was the grandmother hurt?” asked an- 
other. 

“Did they get the girl out of the well?” 
inquired a third. 

“That will do,” said the lawyer. “You 
have all shown much interest in this story.” 
Observing, however, one bright-eyed boy who 
had said nothing so far, he inquired, “Now. 
my little man, what do you make out of my 
story ?” 

The little fellow blushed and, after a mo- 


112 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


merit’s hesitation, replied, “Did he kill that 
squirrel? That’s what I want to know.” 

“You are the boy I want,” said the lawyer. 
“You can not be switched off from the main 
question by all this confusion of a burning 
barn, a screaming child, or hired girls or 
grandmothers. You kept your eye on the 
squirrel.” 

The same principle would apply to spiri- 
tual conditions with much more force than 
to temporal. A thousand and one things are 
constantly occurring to divert our minds 
from the one great question, “Am I living a 
clean, holy life? Do I keep my eyes single to 
the glory of God, so that when Jesus comes I 
may be found of Him in peace ready for His 
appearing ?” 


XIX. 


THE HILL TWINS AND THE MILL TWINS. 

HEBE were two pairs of twins in 
Newton — the twins who lived in the 
big brick house up on the hill, and 
the twins who lived in the little 
white-washed cottage down near the mill. 
And since there were two pairs of twins, and 
both born on the self-same day, the little 
town took a great interest in them, and felt 
proud of all four children. 

“The hill-twins and the mill-twins” is the 
way the town people spoke of them. The 
“mill-twins” did not mind this at all, but 
the “hill-twins” always felt like resenting 
such familiarity, and, as a result, were not 
overmuch pleased that the mill-twins were 
born on the same day as themselves. 

“Why can’t they learn to call people by 
their right names? for surely there is dif- 
ference enough in them to tell us apart,” 
said the hill-twins, indignantly. Tid and Bid 
Fagan were the names of the mill-twins, and * 



113 


114 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


the hill-twins were Clarence and Margaret 
Stansbury. 

“Then, besides, doesn’t everybody know 
that our father owns the mill, and that their 
father just — just worked in it — when he was 
living?” said Margaret. 

The Stansbury twins were to have a grand 
celebration of their twelfth birthday, and 
were given full liberty to choose their guests 
themselves, and it was while making out the 
list of those they intended to invite that the 
Fagan twins were brought so prominently 
before them. Newton was a small place, and 
there were not very many children of their 
age, so the name of nearly every child in the 
village was put on the list, for Mr. and Mrs. 
Stansbury desired to make as many children 
as possible happy. 

“Well, we won’t invite Tid and Bid 
Fagan,” declared Clarence. “I’m just tired 
of people always saying, ‘Isn’t it nice to have 
two pairs of twins in our little town ?’ ” 

“Yes, and saying, ‘Bid and Margaret are 
just of a size, and their hair is as much alike 
as if they were twins themselves,’ ” said 
Margaret, with a good deal of feeling in her 
voice. 

So the Stansbury twins decided that the 


THE HILL TWINS AND THE MILL TWINS 115 


Fagan twins should not be invited, and when 
their list of guests was completed, Tid and 
Bid Fagan's names were not included, much 
to their satisfaction. 

Meanwhile all the children were won- 
dering who would get an invitation, and 
wishing that they might be among the for- 
tunate ones. Down by the mill the news 
was told, and the Fagan twins talked it over 
one day as they sat in the shade near the 
hedge that surrounded the Stansbury place. 

“Biddie, an’ do yer think we’ll be asked 
up at the hill?” asked Tid. 

“Indeed an’ I don’t know, but me heart’s 
full of a longin’ to go,” answered his sister. 

“Sure, an’ I wish they’d be askin’ us, for 
there’s to be a big time, Biddie.” 

“I’d be after askin’ thim first of all, nixt 
to mother, bein’ as their birthday an’ ours 
comes at the same time; wouldn’t you, Tid?” 
asked Biddie. 

“I would that, Biddie, indeed ; an’ I heard 
Clarence tell them Bell boys there was to 
be no end of ice cream, an’ cake, an’ candy, 
an’ — an’ — everything that’s good,” declared 
Tid. 

“Isn’t it nice, Biddie, to be born on the 
same day as Clarence and Margaret Stans- 


lie 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


bury? It makes us feel ginteel ourselves,” 
said Tid. 

“Sure an’ every time I see Margaret’s 
brown hair I’m so pleased to think that 
mine’s a wee bit like her own ; an’ she’s such 
a lovely, ladylike girl that I’m always hopin’ 
I may be like her — I mean in my manners,” 
said Bid, with a feeling of admiration in 
her heart. 

“Yes, an’ Clarence is a born gintleman like 
his father, an’ I’m trying to copy his ways,” 
Tid replied. 

“Of course, Tiddie, we can’t be expectin’ 
to be bid, for we haven’t nice enough clothes 
to go, like the rest of them; but I’d like to 
go just the same,” said Biddie, wistfully. 
“But we better be goin’ home now, Tiddie, to 
help mother wid the wasliin’, instid of sit- 
tin’ here in idleness.” Then hand in hand 
they ran down the hill toward their home. 

The Stansbury twins meanwhile sat per- 
fectly still in the little rustic arbor just on 
the other side of the hedge, and for a few 
moments after Tid and Bid had gone neither 
looked at the other, and not a word was spo- 
ken until Clarence asked with a downcast 
glance of his eyes, which meant that he felt 
a tinge of shame over his determination not 


THE HILL TWINS AND THE MILL TWINS 117 


to invite Tid and Bid Fagan, “What shall 
we do?” 

“Do? Why put their names at the head 
of the list, to be sure, for I’m real ashamed 
of myself,” said Margaret. 

“And, Margaret, I’m going to ask father 
and mother to buy Tid a new suit, instead 
of getting me that kodak I wanted for a 
birthday present.” 

“I’ll do without the present that I wanted, 
and instead ask them to buy a new dress and 
some other things for Biddie,” declared Mar- 
garet. 

The first thing the Stansbury twins did 
after going into the house was to place the 
Fagan twins’ names at the top of the list. 
Then they unfolded their plans to their par- 
ents. 

“Certainly!” said Mr. Stansbury. 

“It shall be just as you say,” agreed their 
mother. 

That was a beautiful day when the chil- 
dren met to celebrate the birthday of the 
twins, and as they romped under the trees 
with hearts full of happiness Tid and Clar- 
ence, and Bid and Margaret, were often seen 
together in the thickest of the fun. At the 
end of the evening when Clarence and Mar- 


118 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


garet bade them good-niglit, it was hard to 
tell which pair of twins was happier — 
whether the Stansbury twins on the hill, 
or the Fagan twins down by the mill. 

“It is more blessed to give than to re- 
ceive.” 


XX. 


A NEW HAND AT THE BELLOWS. 


WO soldiers in a hospital in the city 
of Washington were talking quietly. 

“I say, Jim, there’s a new hand 
at the bellows in this hospital — we 
never had things so nice before.” 

“That’s so. I tell you she drills them, she 
does! When she first came, and I heard 
her dressing down the nurses, I thought she 
was a savage woman, but when she comes 
to the sick ones — she’s ten mothers rolled 
into one!” 

“This is the first time anything has tasted 
good since I came in here,” sighed a weak 
skeleton of a man on the next couch. The 
new matron stood very little upon ceremony 
— she expressed her opinion upon persons as 
unhesitatingly as upon things. She rebuked 
the assistant surgeons when they neglected 
their proper duties, and became such a thorn 
in their sides that they determined to oust 
her. One morning the surgeon in charge was 



119 


120 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


sleeping off liis drunkenness after a “spree” 
of the night before. At eleven o’clock, when 
he did come, the matron confronted him with 
a few terrible sentences: 

“All these sick men left without attention, 
that you might indulge a brutal appetite!” 
she said, with cold emphasis. 

“A great fuss over a little matter,” said 
the surgeon angrily: “I know my business, 
and I shan’t tolerate your meddling.” 

“I know my business, too,” said the ma- 
tron, “and you shall find that out.” 

Within a week came a new matron, with 
an order from headquarters, superseding the 
other. Mrs. Bissel saw that the woman 
seemed both sensible and kindly, so she said 
quietly : 

“I wish you would withhold this matter 
till the afternoon.” 

“Certainly, madam, if it will make a dif- 
ference to you.” 

Mrs. Bissel immediately put on her bonnet 
and shawl, and started for the White House, 
where she made one of fifteen or twenty 
people waiting. A door-keeper stood at the 
first door on the right as she entered. She 
approached him and asked: 

“Is the President in?” 


A NEW HAND AT THE BELLOWS 


121 


“Yes, ma’am. Let me have your card, 
please.” 

Within half an hour she was admitted. 
The room was large, and furnished like a 
country lawyer’s office. At a green baize 
table near the window sat a long, lean man, 
running his hand through stiff, black hair, 
struck through with grey. 

“Well, ma’am! What can I do for you?” 

“You can do nothing for me,” she said, 
respectfully, “but you can do a good deal 
for the soldiers.” 

She briefly narrated her experience, to 
which the President listened attentively. 

“I wish, Mr. President, that you would 
ask the chief medical director here to look 
into this matter with his own eyes, and not 
take his opinions from drunken underlings, 
who, while soldiers shot down in battle are 
lingering and dying before him, is lying 
beastly drunk, and then would turn out of 
charge those who rebuke him !” 

“Madam, I will give you a note to the doc- 
tor, and do you go and talk with him just 
as you have talked to me.” 

He sat down and took an unglazed visiting 

card and wrote with a pencil : — “Dr. , 

Please hear this woman’s statement, and 


122 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


make inquiry in person, and if it is true, 
put her back, and pray for twenty more 
such women. — Abraham Lincoln.” 

“There — you go yourself. If anything 
turns up and don’t go right, you come to 
me again.” 

Armed with this the matron soon found 
the medical chief. It required but little time 
to satisfy him. She was reinstated, the as- 
sistant-surgeon was dismissed from the ser- 
vice, and great fear fell upon all who had 
to do with Agate Bissel ! 


XXI. 


COALS OF FIRE. 

ARMER DAWSON kept missing his 
corn. Every night it was taken 
from the crib, although the door 
was well secured by lock and key. 

'It’s that lazy Tom Slocum/' he exclaimed, 
one morning after missing more than usual. 
“Fve suspected him all the time, and I won’t 
bear it any longer.” 

“What makes you think it’s Tom?” asked 
his wife, pouring out the fragrant coffee. 

“Because he’s the only man around that 
hasn’t any corn — nor anything else, for that 
matter. He spent the summer at the saloons 
while his neighbors were at work. Now they 
have plenty and he has nothing — serves him 
just right, too.” 

“But his family are suffering,” rejoined his 
wife. “They are sick and in need of food 
and medicine ; should we not help them ?” 

“No!” growled the farmer; “if he finds 
his neighbors are going to take care of his 
128 



124 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


family, it will encourage him to spend the 
next season as he did the last. Better send 
him to jail and his family to the poorhouse, 
and I’m going to do it, too. I’ve laid a plan 
to trap him this very night, and I’m going 
to carry it out.” 

“Now, while Tom is reaping the bitter 
fruits of his folly, is it not the very time to 
help him to a better life?” suggested his 
wife. 

“A little course of law would be the most 
effective thing for him,” replied the farmer. 

“In this case coals of fire would be better. 
Try the coals first, William; try the coals 
first.’ 

Farmer Dawson made no reply, but fin- 
ished his breakfast and walked out of the 
house with the decided step of one who has 
made up his mind that something is going 
to be done. 

His wife sighed as she went about her 
work, thinking of the weary, heart-broken 
mother with her sick, hungry babes around 
her. 

The farmer proceeded to examine his cribs, 
and, after a thorough search found a hole 
large enough to admit a man’s hands. 

“There’s the leak!” he exclaimed; “I’ll 


COALS OF FIRE 


125 


fix that,” and lie went to setting a trap in- 
side. 

Next morning he arose earlier than usual 
and went out to the cribs. His trap had 
caught a man — Tom Slocum — the very one 
he had suspected! 

He seemed to take no notice of the thief, 
but turned aside into the barn and began 
heaping the manger with hay — sweet-scented 
from the summer’s harvest field. Then he 
opened the crib doors and took out the 
golden ears — the fruit of his honest toil. 

All the time he was thinking what to do. 
Should he try the law or the coals? The 
law was what the man deserved, but his 
wife’s words kept ringing through his mind. 
He emptied the corn into the feeding-trough, 
then he went around where the man stood 
with one hand in the trap. 

“Well, neighbor, what are you doing 
here?” he asked. 

Poor Tom answered, “Nothing;” but the 
downcast guilty face confessed more than 
words could have done. 

Farmer Dawson released the imprisoned 
hand, and, taking Tom’s sack, ordered him 
to hold it while he filled it with the coveted 
grain. 


12G 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


“There, Tom, take that,” said the farmer, 
“and after this, when you want corn, come 
to me and I’ll let you have it on trust for 
work. I need another good, steady hand on 
my farm, and will give steady work with 
good wages.” 

“Oh, sir,” replied Tom, quite overcome, 
“I’ve been wanting work, but no one would 
hire me. My family are suffering, and I’m 
ashamed to beg. But I’ll work for this and 
every ear I have taken, if you will give me 
a chance.” 

“Very well, Tom,” said the farmer; “take 
the corn to the mill, and make things com- 
fortable about the home to-day, and to-mor- 
row we’ll begin. But there’s one thing you 
must agree to first.” 

Tom lifted an inquiring gaze. 

“You must let whisky alone,” continued 
the farmer ; “you must promise not to touch 
a drop.” 

The tears sprang into Tom’s eyes, and his 
voice trembled with emotion, as he said: 

“You are the first man that ever told me 
that. There’s always enough to say, ‘Come, 
Tom, take a drink,’ and I have drunk until 
I thought there was no use trying to be a 
better man. But since you care enough to 


COALS OF FIRE 


127 


urge me to stop drinking, I’m bound to make 
the trial; that I will, sir.” 

Farmer Dawson took Tom to the house 
and gave him his breakfast, while his wife 
put up a basket of food for the suffering 
family in the poor man’s home. 

Tom went to work the next day and the 
next. In time he became an efficient hand 
on the Dawson place. He stopped stealing 
and drinking, attended church and Sunday- 
school with his family, and became a respect- 
able member of society. 

“How changed Tom is!” remarked the 
farmer’s wife, one day. 

“Yes, my dear,” replied the husband, “and 
next to God, the ‘coals of fire’ did it.” 


XXII. 


JOHN PLOUGHMAN, JR. 

AY bindings may cover bad books, and 
grand clothes hide godless hearts. 

A gossip’s mouth is the devil’s 
mail bag. 

The soul’s play-day is Satan’s work-day. 

Too many sermons would have no Bible 
in them if it were not the fashion to take 
a text. 

Christ doesn’t need martyrs to expire for 
Him as much as He needs men and women 
to perspire for Him. 

Gospel shot is of small effect without di- 
vine gunpowder. 

No man ever lost anything in this world 
by attending properly to the next. 

Don’t turn over a new leaf unless you have 
something sensible to write on the page. 

An unregenerate soul wouldn’t find any- 
thing more to enjoy in heaven than a blind 
man in a picture-gallery. 

Job found plenty of time to offer burnt* 



128 


JOHN TLOUGHMAN, JR. 


129 


offerings for each one of his ten children be- 
cause he went at it early in the morning. 

Millstones always make more noise when 
there is no corn being ground, and loud 
talkers seldom produce more than sound. 

“Great cry and little wool” will not pay 
the farmer, and where no profit comes from 
preaching the shorter the sermon the better. 

The devil gets much of his best work done 
by the people who love to tell bad news. 

If you would enjoy a holiday make it a 
holy day. 

Backsliding is going to heaven by taking 
one step forward to two backward. 

If you love it is impossible to fear, and if 
you fear it is impossible to love. 

The quickest way of getting people to be- 
lieve in a thing is to believe in it yourself. 

The Christian is not ruined by living in 
the world but by the world living in him. 


XXIII. 


“I TRUST YOU.” 

WAS only twelve years old, and a 
pick-pocket and thief-in-general in 
Brighton. I had a round, rosy, in- 
nocent-looking face, and very good 
manners when I chose to assume them. 

One wet, dreary day in October I was 
lounging against the railings in Albert 
Street, when a door on the other side was 
opened, and a clear, ringing whistle attracted 
my notice. A young man stood on the steps 
holding some letters in his hands. I dashed 
across and touched my cap. 

“Can you post these for me?” he inquired. 
“I am sorry to send you in the rain, but there 
is no one here to take them, and I dare not 
go out myself, as I am not well.” I noticed 
then that he looked very ill. He was tall 
and slender, not more than twenty -four years 
of age, but his face was white and thin, with 
a bright, crimson spot on either cheek, and 
the blue veins stood out like cords on his 



130 


“i TRUST YOU” 131 

temples, and the long, thin hands were al- 
most transparent. He had a thick, plaid 
wrapper around him, but he shivered in the 
damp air. 

‘Til post them, sir,” I said, quickly. 

“Thank you. Here’s a shilling for you; 
and will you also run around to Mr. Gordon's 
— the pastor of St. John’s Church, you know 
— with this little packet?” 

“Certainly, sir;” but all my professional 
cunning could not keep the delighted grin 
from my face. That packet contained 
money; Mr. Gordon might bless his stars if 
he ever saw it. I think the beautiful eyes 
read my thoughts. The invalid’s thin hands 
rested lightly on my shoulders, and he looked 
me straight in the face. 

“I trust you, my boy,” he said, gently. 

“You may, sir,” I answered promptly, as 
I touched my cap again. 

He put his hand to his side, with a look 
of pain as lie turned away. I hurried off on 
my errands. 

“No one ever said that to me before, nor 
had reason to; but here goes to Mr. Gor- 
don’s.” 

I got a job that kept me all the next day. 
When it was finished I ran around to Albert 


132 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


Street. I wanted to tell the man that had 
trusted me that, for the first time in my life, 
I had been worthy of trust. 

With far greater pain than I felt when my 
father was taken to prison for breaking a 
policeman’s head, I saw that all the blinds 
were drawn. With the boldness of a street 
Arab, I ran up the steps and rang the bell. 
A sour-looking woman opened the door, much 
to my regret. 

“What do you want?” she demanded. 

“Please can I see the gentleman that lives 
here?” 

“No, you can’t; he’s dead.” 

“Dead!” I cried, bursting into tears, re- 
gardless of the passers-by. 

“Come inside, boy, and tell me what is the 
matter,” said the woman. 

I sobbed out my story, and begged her 
to let me just look at my friend. 

“What is the matter?” inquired a gentle 
voice ; and I turned to see a young lady with 
fair hair and gray eyes dimmed with weep- 
ing. 

“This boy wants to see your brother, Miss 
Graham,” said the landlady, briefly; ‘die 
says he spoke kindly to him yesterday.” 

“At what time?” she asked, eagerly. 


133 


“I TRUST YOU” 

“Late in the afternoon, please, miss,” I 
sobbed. 

She glanced at the woman. 

“Perhaps he was the last one darling 
Claude spoke to,” she said, trying to steady 
her voice. 

“Come here and tell me what he said to 
you,” said "Miss Graham, gently. 

I repeated all I had told the landlady. 

“So like him!” she murmured, tears in 
her eyes; “and you would like to see him? 
Come with me, then.” 

She led the way up-stairs to a quiet room, 
where lay the lifeless form of the only man 
who had ever spoken kindly to me. 

He lay as if asleep, the fair head turned a 
little to one side, the white hands folded in 
a natural position on the lifeless breast, and 
on the calm features rested the peacefulness 
of that repose which “God gives to His be- 
loved.” 

My tears fell fast as I gazed at the sweet 
face. “I wanted to tell him that I kept my 
word,” I sobbed, “but now he will never 
know.” 

The bereaved sister laid her hand on my 
arm. “Ask God to prepare you to go where 
he has gone, and then you can tell him.” 


134 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


“I will,” I answered, checking my tears. 
“Please, miss, may I kiss him?” 

She nodded, and I kissed the cold, rigid 
lips, which only a few hours before had ut- 
tered that gentle, “I trust you, my boy.” 

“Fll starve before I’ll steal again,” I said, 
as I followed Miss Graham from the room. 

And I kept my word. I am now, by God’s 
goodness, a prosperous and happy man ; but 
I eagerly anticipate the day when I shall 
be able to tell him how much his trust in 
me has accomplished. 


XXIV. 


HOW I WOULD PAINT A SALOON. 

HE following- timely suggestions have 
been made by a recent writer: 

“If I had the adorning of a bar- 
room, it should be done something 
on this wise: 

“On one side I would paint Death on the 
Pale Horse, his arm wielding the thunder- 
bolt, the fiery hoofs of his flying steed tread- 
ing down everything fair and lovely, the 
Garden of Eden before him, a blackened 
waste behind. 

“On the other side I would draw the pic- 
ture of a wretched hovel, once a happy home, 
the roof broken in, the window stuffed with 
rags, in the doorway a weeping wife with 
ragged children clinging to her skirts, pit- 
eously beseeching the once happy husband 
and father, now a reeling drunkard, on his 
way from the village tavern to the hut he 
calls his home. 

“Back of the bar, in full view of the 



135 


136 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


bloated creatures who stand with the cup to 
their lips, I would paint a company of de- 
mons, in the death-dance of a fiend’s hilarity 
and a fire kindled with the flames of alcohol, 
and over it I would write in lurid letters, 
Moderate drinking lights the flame to the 
lowest hell. 

“Opposite the bar should be a lonely and 
dishonored grave; a lightning blasted tree 
should there spread its leafless branches over 
it and on some withered bough should perch 
the melancholy owl, hooting to the moon. 
At the foot of the grave should kneel the 
Angel of Mercy, with hands and eyes up- 
raised to the pitying heavens, and at the 
head of the grave should be the Angel of 
Justice, carving, with stern, relentless hand, 
upon the tombstone these words of doom : 

“No drunkard shall inherit the kingdom 
of God. 

“In the intervening spaces I would have 
here a grinning skeleton, and there a broken 
heart, a stranded boat, a torch extinguished 
in blackness of darkness, while from the 
doorway and from the ceiling should look 
down all kinds of woeful human faces — pale, 
imploring, wrathful, deadly, despairing. 

“The wall of the room should be shrouded 


HOW I WOULD PAINT A SALOON 


137 


in sackcloth, the floor covered with ashes, 
and the bar wreathed with weeping willow 
and gloomy cypress; while all the vessels 
that held the damning fluid should be black 
— black as the gates of doom. 

“Then I would call the rumseller to take 
his place behind the bar, and though a few 
besotted in crime might stagger up to the 
bar and freely drink defiance to their fate, 
yet I should hope that the young — the 
pride of mothers and the light of the home — 
might turn away as though they had caught 
a glimpse of the infernal world.” 


XXV. 


LIFE FOR THE CZAR. 

HE clear, cold rajs of a January sun 
were shining upon a little clearing 
in the woods of northern Russia 
more than two hundred years ago. 
The snow lay white and heavy upon the 
clearing, and half covered the topple-down 
hut or cabin, from whose chimney the smoke 
was ascending in thin spiral columns. A 
young lad not more than fourteen or fifteen, 
sturdy, strong and ruddy, with a shock of 
blonde hair rippling upon the fur collar of 
his doublet, was busy making a path 
through the snow in the direction of the 
forest. 

He had not finished shoveling when the 
cabin door opened and a woman appeared 
on the threshold. 

“Boris,” she screamed, “there is no wood 
for a fire, or at least enough only to cook our 
dinner. You must get a load before night.” 

“That I will, mother,” answered the boy. 



138 



Boris . . . seized his heavy ax, and started off” — Page 139 




















•< 













































LIFE FOR THE CZAR 


139 


“We will not be without fuel, even if we 
have to cut down the Czar’s woods,” and he 
seemed to redouble his exertions with the 
shovel, making the light snow fly over his 
shoulders till his bearskin cap was as white 
as the flakes themselves. 

Suddenly he paused to listen. There 
came a cry from the forest, the cry of one 
in need, and Boris, pausing just long enough 
to locate the call, rushed into the cabin and 
seized his heavy ax, and started off in the 
direction of the sound. 

The snow was deep, and Boris did not 
make rapid progress, but his steps were 
hastened by another call for help. This 
time much more in earnest than the first. 
Whoever it was, stood in mortal need of 
help, Boris realized, and he sprang forward 
with great strides, hoping to be in time to 
render assistance before it was too late. 

“Here. To me, for the Czar’s sake, quick !” 

Boris heard the cry right in front of him, 
and, leaping around a huge fir-tree, whose 
snowy branches presented a barrier, the boy 
saw a sight that for a moment held him spell- 
bound. 

A man, a stranger, was struggling hand 
to hand with a huge brown bear, the largest 


140 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


Boris had ever seen. The man, apparently 
a hunter who had wandered out of his way, 
was tall and strong, but the bear was taller 
than he, and was evidently getting the bet- 
ter of him. Inch by inch he was losing 
ground, and just as Boris halted he fell 
backward with a groan, and the great beast 
precipitated himself upon its prostrate foe. 

Boris hesitated but an instant. The next 
second he bounded forward and brought 
his ax down with a powerful blow upon 
bruin’s head. The keen steel, driven with 
all his force, penetrated the brute’s skull, 
and he toppled over without a struggle and 
lay dead. 

“That was a good Russian blow, my lad,” 
said the man, as he struggled out from un- 
der the bear’s carcass, and proceeded to wipe 
the blood from his clothes. “Your ax was 
more faithful than my spear,” and he kicked 
the broken weapon contemptuously aside. 

Boris gazed at the stranger admiringly. 
He was almost a giant in size, dark and 
swarthy in complexion, and had a pair of 
the keenest, fiercest eyes that ever lighted 
the face of mortal man. His clothes were 
rich, too, and Boris made up his mind that 
he must belong at court, for he had heard 


LIFE FOR THE CZAR 


141 


that the Czar was at Archangel for a few 
weeks’ hunting. This surely must be one 
of his great lords. 

“Well, you see, I am good for another 
bear-fight yet, my lad, though may I have 
a surer spear-staff next time I meet one. 
You saved my life, my boy, and how shall 
Pertrushke pay you? Come and see me 
to-morrow morning at Archangel, and I will 
see what can be done for you.” 

“Very well, barin (gentleman) ; if you 
will show me the Czar, I think I will 
come,” said Boris. 

“That I can, and I assure you now that 
he will be glad to see you.” 

“But how shall I know the Czar?” asked 
Boris, with something of a trembling voice 
as he thought of the great man he was to 
meet. 

“You will have no trouble in knowing the 
Czar,” returned the stranger; “for when 
everybody around him will have their hats 
off, he will keep his on. You can not for- 
get that, my lad, and you will know him at 
once.” 

“I think I shall remember that,” said 
Boris, with a smile. “But come in now and 
have some breakfast.” 


142 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


Before the stranger had time to accept or 
refuse the invitation, they were subjected to 
a sudden interruption. There were shouts 
and bugle calls, and a party of horsemen rode 
into the clearing, trampling down the snow 
and gathering around the stranger, who 
stood regarding them with a queer smile on 
his grim lip. Boris noticed that each horse- 
man as he halted pulled off his cap and sat 
bareheaded in the presence of the tall hunt- 
er, so he naturally lifted his and kept it in 
his hand. 

“Well, my young bear-killer,” is aid the 
stranger, “you need not w T ait till to-morrow, 
either to come to Archangel or to see the 
Czar.” 

The boy dropped suddenly upon his knees 
in the snow. “I knew you w r ere a great 
man, and now I know you must be Czar 
Peter himself,” he said, “but I can not go 
to Archangel to-day.” 

“And why not?” asked the autocrat of 
all the Bussias, with the least perceptible 
frown. 

“Because I have to cut some wood for my 
mother,” answered Boris. 

“Is that all?” said Peter. “That need not 
keep you,” and he ordered the horsemen all 


LIFE FOR THE CZAR 


143 


to dismount and help Boris collect his wood 
pile and prepare it for the fire. This done, 
he flung the widow a large purse and told 
her that he was going to take her son to 
court and make a man of him. 

And Czar Peter kept his word, as history 
shows, for Boris kept the Czar’s favor all 
his life, and helped all through his wonder- 
ful career, and died at last as a great boyard. 
Many of the noble families of Russia have in 
their veins to-day the blood of the brave 
young Boris Goulousky, who risked his life 
for great Czar Peter. 


XXVI. 


HER RELIGION. 


O ^N THE early part of June a little 
m tribe of gipsies camped on the bor- 
Iflg der of the boulevards leading from 
Boston into the country. For 
years, long before the country road was 
broadened and made a great electric thor- 
oughfare, the same band had returned to 
the same spot with the regularity of birds 
that arrive in the spring. The queen of the 
tribe was a woman of singular stateliness 
and beauty. 

Last spring she fell ill. Her fine, dark 
face took on the waxen hue of an incurable 
malady, and her eyes, expressive and queen- 
ly, were dulled with suffering. She finally 
sent for a lady, who, for years had bought 
baskets of her, and had done her many kind- 
nesses. 

“I think you had better see a doctor,” 
said the lady. “You need medical advice, 
and care.” 


144 


HER RELIGION 


145 


The gipsy objected, but at last gave con- 
sent. 

The physician examined his new patient 
gravely. She was smitten with a mortal 
disease and must surely die. 

“I will take her to my house/’ said the 
lady, for she was very fond of this gipsy 
queen. 

“No,” the woman replied, with a wan 
smile. “Thank you, but I can’t do it. I 
have lived all my life out of doors, and 
shall die happier in my tent than even with 
you, dear lady.” - 

From day to day the lady visited the dying 
gipsy, and the talk naturally drifted upon 
those eternal topics the value of which ap- 
proaching death enhances. 

“I don’t know your religion,” said the 
gipsy, “but mine is very simple. My mother 
died a Romany, and my father will die a 
Romany, just the same; but I will die a Bur- 
ton.” 

“A Burton! What do you mean?” ex- 
claimed the lady, horrified at this new re- 
ligion of which she had never heard. * 

“Why, you see, when I was a little girl, 
we lived near Philadelphia. Nobody looked 
out for us, or cared much for me, but a 


146 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


woman who was a city missionary. Her 
name was Miss Burton. Every Sunday she 
came out to visit me. She taught me to 
read the New Testament.” The gipsy took 
from under her pillow a frayed, worn little 
volume. 

“I was taught by her to read this print,” 
she said, “and can’t read any other. This is 
the only book I can really read, and I read 
it every day. Miss Burton took me to Sun- 
day-school, and gave me a penny to put in 
the contribution box, and brought me back. 
She told me about Jesus, and how He loved 
others more than Himself, and that if I fol- 
lowed the teaching of Jesus, I should go to 
heaven when I died. 

“One Sunday Miss Burton did not come. 
I was about ten years old. She had died 
of over- work. I think she died a good deal 
for me; and wherever heaven is, I know 
Miss Burton is there, and I have tried to 
live so that when I die I may go to meet 
the best friend I ever had. This has been 
my prayer every day. Is this religion of 
mine the same as yours ?” 

The lady who told the story said that she 
broke down then, and in reply to the ques- 
tion could only say: 


HER RELIGION 


147 


“Yes, dear, my religion is the same that 
Miss Burton taught you. I wish I had 
taught and lived so well. When your time 
comes, I have no doubt that you will not 
only meet your teacher, but the Great 
Teacher, who taught her.” 

We hear much about holding a mirror up 
to nature. It is a favorite quotation. To re- 
flect the beauty of the world in a beautiful 
life is a fine art; but it is nobler to reflect 
Christ to lives that know Him not. That 
is the noblest thing a person can do. 


XXVII. 


LELIA’S TENTH. 


DEAR, I think it’s just a shame to 
ask poor folks like me, who haven’t 
a cent to spare, to give for missions. 
Now there’s Grace Lee, she’s ' so 
stingy. I’m sure, if I had as much as she 
has, I’d—” 

Lelia’s face looked as if a serious thunder- 
storm was brewing. Nothing to occasion it 
but a small colored card, which she scowled 
at wrathfully. This is what she read : 

'‘Dear Little Friend: Surely you want 
to help us in the grand work of bringing sun- 
shine and joy into sad hearts, and telling 
the sweet story of a Savior’s love to the 
children who are your little brothers and 
sisters, be they black, white or brown. Will 
you pledge a tenth of your money each week ? 
For Jesus’ sake, and in His name?” 

A line was left at the close for the written 
answer. 

Lelia scrawled a decided "No” with her 



148 


lelia ’ s tenth 


149 

pencil, and threw it down with such a bang 
that Aunt Julia looked in from the next 
room. 

“What’s the matter, childie? You needn’t 
say, ‘Nothing,’ for your forehead looks as 
if some one had sewed a seam down the 
middle of it.” 

Lelia couldn’t help laughing as she ex- 
plained rather grumblingly about the card. 

“Don’t you think it’s a shame, Aunt 
Julia?” she continued. “Now, the other 
girls have money; but you know I haven’t.” 

“Perhaps they feel as you do about it. If 
everybody did, Lelia, there would have been 
no steps taken all these years to obey our 
Lord’s command, ‘Go ye therefore and teach 
all nations.’ Think how that would have 
been.” 

“I don’t care. I haven’t any money to 
give to the heathen nor to anything else 
either.” 

Aunt Julia went to her cabinet and took 
a daintily bound morocco account book from 
a drawer. 

“I have a plan, dear. Suppose, for one 
week, you keep account with yourself. Be- 
gin Monday with the money papa gives you 
for your expenses, and put down all you 


150 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


spend. Then at the end of the week we will 
go over it together. 

Lelia took the pretty book willingly. She 
“hated” arithmetic and accounts, but the 
silver-mounted pencil which Aunt Julia pro- 
duced from another drawer proved the sugar- 
coating to the bitter pill. 

Faithfully during the next week she strug- 
gled through “debtor” and “creditor.” 
Promptly Saturday morning Aunt Julia 
asked for the book in order to look over the 
account. 

“I’m afraid it isn’t very neat,” said Lelia, 
doubtfully ; “but I did the best I could.” 

“It will do, my dear,” said auntie, briskly. 
“Now, let me see; we will go over it together, 
for my eyesight isn’t what it was, and your 
writing certainly is a little crooked. It 
will begin here, I suppose: ‘Received on 
Saturday, $1.’ ” 

“That’s what papa gives me every week; 
but you know it doesn’t go very far, Aunt 
Julia.” 

“ ‘One yard of pink satin ribbon, 50 
cents,’ ” read Aunt Julia. “Why I thought 
you had sashes, Lelia.” 

“Oh, that was to go to Elsie on her birth- 
day.” 


lelia’s^tenth 


151 


‘One pound of caramels, 15 cents/ ” 

“You know liow I love caramels. I simply 
couldn’t resist these. I think I bought them 
Wednesday.” 

“Yes, I remember you kept your mother 
up all that night with the toothache. ‘Chew- 
ing gum, 5 cents.’ ” 

“I don’t chew gum very often,” confessed 
Lelia, “just once in a while.” 

“ ‘Three cups of hot chocolate,’ ” read 
Aunt Julia, disapprovingly. 

“I’m awfully fond of hot chocolate, Auntie, 
and Baird’s is just delicious. It did give 
me a headache though,” 

“ ‘Silver bangle, 15 cents.’ ” 

“What was that? Oh, now I remember. 
That sweet little turtle I showed you last 
night. They are so sweet. Nellie Winn 
thinks she’s so smart because she has fifteen 
on her bracelet, and this one makes sixteen 
for me.” 

“That ends the account, I suppose,” said 
Aunt Julia, closing the little book. “Well, 
little girl, do you know I think that you love 
your sweet tooth and your clothes a great 
deal more than the poor little heathen chil- 
dren. I can’t find on this list one thing 
necessary, or even wise, for you to buy. Your 


152 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


mother made some sacrifices to buy a sash 
only a month or so ago. I am sure you 
would have been far better off without so 
much sweet stuff, and I am sure your father 
dislikes the habit of chewing gum. Now, 
Lelia, the lesson I wanted to teach you is 
that you spend on your stomach several times 
the little offering your missionary card asked 
for. A dime here and a nickel there doesn’t 
seem much, but we can’t measure the good 
they might do if they were spent in the right 
way, and if Jesus’ blessing was asked on 
them. I don’t think He could bless such 
selfishly-spent money. 

Lelia looked troubled. 

“Well, Auntie, as you have found me out, 
I can’t deny anything. Unless it was down 
in black and white, I wouldn’t believe I’d 
spent so much for candy. I s’pos I’m selfish. 
I do wish I could be more generous, Auntie,” 
said Lelia, meekly ; “but I don’t know where 
to begin.” 

“But some One will help you, if you ask 
Him. He is so much more ready to help than 
we are to ask Him to do so.” 

Lelia was silent a moment, then she sprang 
up with a look of resolve. 

“I am glad I haven’t handed in my mis- 


lelia’s tenth 


153 


sionary card yet. I’m going to scratch that 
‘No’ out and put a ‘Yes’ in its place just as 
quick as ever I can!” 

And Aunt Julia smiled and felt satis- 
fied. 


XXVIII. 

MAKING A START. 

HE way to learn to do things is to do 
things. The way to learn a trade 
is to work at it. Success teaches 
how to succeed. Begin with the 
determination to succeed, and the work is 
half done already. Delay wastes time, weak- 
ens the will, dissipates energy, discourages 
ambition, and prophesies failure. Resolve, 
and do ! Do it now ! Decide, and get at it ! 
The doctor delays one minute, and the in- 
jured man bleeds to death. The order of 
the general commanding delayed one min- 
ute in its transmission, and the battle is 
lost and the political face of a continent 
changed. Opportunity rushes by like a whirl- 
wind, like the fleet lightning. Grasp it, or 
it is gone forever! 

Take hold of things. If you have several 
things to do, do the hardest task first. The 
bundle of grain you are to bind is half 
thistles. Grasp it promptly and strongly, 



154 


MAKING A START 


155 


and it will not hurt. You will not feel the 
nettles if you take hold of them with a tre- 
mendous grip. You will not feel the cold, 
if you enter the stream with a single plunge. 

Every man who is a man indeed is a 
self-made man. Your dependence must be 
upon yourself. Encourage reliance upon 
your own self. You will have yourself al- 
ways with you. Listen to the advice of 
others. It is the voice of experience. Trust 
in God. He will not fail you. But decisions 
are with you. 

Begin to do; but, in the choice of what 
you do, let conscience reign supreme. This 
is the right course to pursue, and you will 
have no peace if you try another course. If 
you do wrong, conscience will never let you 
hear the last of it. Conscience never forgets. 
It is not safe to attempt to conceal the small- 
est things from conscience. Conscience is 
all eyes and all ears. First of all, then, work 
in harmony with conscience. 

To get along in the world and make for 
yourself a good name, you can place no 
dependence upon mere chance. Pluck must 
be your hero. Wait not for a chance. 
Chances seldom come to people. If a chance 
does come, it will not help you unless you 


150 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


are prepared to take it. Make your own 
cliance. You will feel more a man if you 
do this. Things are truly yours only when, 
by the help of God, you earn them, conquer 
them, make them, create them. Expect to 
make your own way in the world, and do it. 

Hold to your purpose. Be not swerved 
from it. Zealous to-day, and discouraged 
and indolent tomorrow, accomplishes little. 
Always at it — this accomplishes results. The 
genius for hard work is the best kind of 
genius.- A flash of lightning — and dark- 
ness! The everlasting sunbeams — what a 
difference ! Keep at it ! The work in which 
you are at any one time engaged, is the 
greatest and most important work in all the 
universe at that time for you. 

An endowment of cheerfulness is a for- 
tune. It is endurance and health and long- 
life. Blessed are the cheerful, for they shall 
always have within themselves a fountain of 
joy. “Give us, oh give us, the man who sings 
at his work. He will do more in the same 
time, he will do it better, he will persevere 
longer.” 

Do not let any partial failure or mistake 
stop you. There is no other mistake so big 
as doing nothing. Who is kept down? It 


MAKING A START 


157 


is only the man who fails to do his duty. If 
you fail, what about it ? Get up and go on. 

The only life that is successful is that 
which gains the applause of God. The only 
monument that will endure is in the hearts 
of those whose love you have won. With or 
without riches, you may win this applause, 
you may leave a blessed name, you may live 
in the hearts of your friends, you may leave 
the world better than you found it. 


XXIX. 


KINDNESS. 


HAT a kindness it is to one’s self to 
be kind to others! 

There is many an aching heart in 
this world of ours which can never 
be comforted because of hasty words or 
actions strewn along the backward track and 
the opportunities for making amends or ask- 
ing forgiveness are all gone never to return. 

Bishop Hall said that “a good man is 
kinder to his enemy than bad men are to 
their friends.” 

Years ago, while the Revolutionary War 
was still going on, a little company of Bap- 
tists near Philadelphia had for their pastor 
a good man named Peter Miller. He and 
his church were living up to the Bible in- 
junction, “As much as lieth in you, live 
peaceably with all men.” But one ill-natured 
man disliked them and showed his malevo- 
lence in words and acts of abuse until the 
community was stirred with indignation. He 



158 


KINDNESS 


159 


also was guilty of treason and upon being 
convicted was sentenced to be hanged. When 
the sentence was read Miller immediately 
started on foot for Philadelphia, a distance 
of sixty miles, to see General Washington in 
behalf of his foe and to plead for his life. 
He evidently told nothing whatever of the 
personal injuries he and his church had suf- 
fered, for Washington at length told Miller 
that his petition for his friend could not be 
granted. 

“My friend !” exclaimed Miller, “I have 
not a worse enemy living than that man. He 
has heaped abuse upon me and my church.” 

“What !” said Washington, “you have 
walked sixty miles to save the life of your 
enemy. That in my judgment puts the mat- 
ter in a different light ; I will grant you his 
pardon.” 

Miller at once set out on foot with the 
precious document in his pocket, to the place 
of execution which was fifteen miles away. 
The man was being carried to the scaffold 
when Pastor Miller arrived and as soon as 
the criminal caught sight of him in the crowd 
he called out: 

“There is old Peter Miller. He has walked 
all the way from Ephrata to have his re- 


ICO 


THE SILVER SHOWER 


venge gratified to-day by seeing me hung.” 

Miller then stepped forward and gave him 
the pardon and his life was spared. 
















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